Some People Call Me The Space Cowboy
by The Lady Sophrina
Summary: Chapter 14 up at long last. Once upon a time, a handsome young man named Jack met a princess named Katie...slightly AU, pre-Batman Begins. Some familiar faces. DISCLAIMER: I own only my OCs and a deep, heartfelt love for the Nolanverse. RIP to the BSA.
1. Meet Cute

CHAPTER ONE

She didn't see him coming until it was too late. CRASH! Books, papers, and bodies went flying everywhere.

It was on the tip of her tongue to snarl "Watch where you're fucking going!" but the words died on her lips as she got a good look at her accidental assailant.

Longish, curly light-brown hair, gold where the sun hit it…dark brown eyes with permanent smile lines in the corners…a straight nose, a sensuous mouth…what looked to be a _very _nice body beneath his tight black T-shirt and baggy, faded jeans.

"Shit!" said this paragon of masculine beauty. "I'm sorry. Are you all right?"

She was actually pretty sure she had broken her ass bone, if such a thing was possible. But she heard herself saying, "It's OK, I'm fine." Then, incredibly, "I should have been watching where I was going."

"Well, that makes two of us," replied Mr. Yummy. He sprang to his feet with a quick grace that made her think of a big jungle cat—perhaps a panther. _A panther? _scoffed the part of her brain that was still functioning. _Jesus, Katie, why don't you just forget college and start writing bodice-rippers for a living?_

As Katie's physical brain and intellectual one battled it out, the guy was rushing around gathering her books and papers. "Are you sure you're all right?" he asked again. To her mortification Katie realized she was sitting right where she had fallen, probably with a dumb look on her face.

"Of course," she assured him, leaping to her feet and helping him gather her stuff. "I—uh—well, it's just been a long day." A long day, she added silently, that might just be improving.

"No shit," the guy replied as he handed her her things. "I hope I didn't make you late for class or anything."

"Not at all," she said quickly. "Tuesday is my short day."

"Mine too," he said. "Listen—you want to go grab a cup of coffee or something?"

Most guys who showed an interest in Katie were quickly rebuffed. But for most of her life, most guys who showed an interest in Katie Wayne were mainly interested in the Wayne name and fortune, and this guy didn't even know her _first_ name, let alone her last. Besides, as best as she could remember, none of them had been nearly as good-looking as this guy. So she said, "I'd like that."

"Good," he said as they began across the quad toward the campus coffee shop. 'It's the least I can do after running you down. By the way, I'm Jack Napier."

"I'm Katie," she replied. "Katie Wayne."

He showed no sign of recognition at the last name, and his stock jumped even higher in her eyes. Maybe he wasn't from Gotham City originally—she thought he had the faintest trace of a Jersey accent. Then again, Wayne wasn't exactly an uncommon name—not like, say, Astor or Vanderbilt. There were plenty of average-Joe Waynes out there. In fact, for the first few years of her life she had been just plain old Katie Wayne, nobody special. Then her parents had died…

"So what's your major?" Jack brought Katie back to reality.

"Psychology. What about you?"

"Poli sci. How long have you been at Gotham U? I don't think I've seen you around."

"I just started this semester," she replied.

"Oh? Did you transfer from somewhere else?"

"No, I'm a freshman. I graduated from high school a semester early, so I decided to go ahead and start college. What class are you?"

"Sophomore. So you finished high school early? You must be really smart."

She _was _smart, but so far she hadn't done a very good job of proving that. "I guess," she mumbled.

They continued to make small talk, mostly about school, until they were seated at an umbrella-covered table drinking lattes. Jack hadn't even given her a chance to offer to pay; he had just handed the barista a twenty and said, "This is for both our orders." When she protested he had insisted, "No, it's on me. I'm the one who mowed you down." Katie was beginning to like this Jack Napier more and more.

"So, Katie Wayne," he began once they were seated. "Tell me about yourself. Are you from Gotham City?"

Katie was starting to feel relaxed and didn't mind answering his questions. "My family is originally, but I was born in Chicago. I've been in boarding school upstate since first grade."

"Boarding school?" he echoed. "That's not something you hear about often. Are your parents rich or something?"

He stopped short and stared at her. She could see the wheels turning behind his eyes as he put two and two together…_Wayne…boarding school…_ "Holy shit!" he exclaimed. "You're the Wayne heiress!"

Katie debated on what to do now. She wanted to either run off crying, or dump her steaming latte over his head—into his lap would be even better—but neither was exactly appropriate conduct for an heiress. So she lifted her chin, gave him her best dazzling smile, and said coolly, "Well, yes."

"Oh my God!" he burst out. "I can't believe this! The whole campus has been talking about you since the semester began!"

Her shoulders sagged. "They have?" she said. "Great. Grand."

"No, it's OK," he said hastily. "It's because you're so mysterious—everyone knows you're here, but no one seems to know exactly who you are. There are a lot of Waynes on campus, so no one really knows for sure who the Wayne heiress is—or if they do, they're not telling." He gazed at her intently. She fought the urge to check for a foam mustache.

"What's wrong?" she asked finally.

He blushed and ducked his head. "It's just that…well…you don't exactly look the way I figured an heiress would look," he mumbled.

Katie's annoyance turned to amusement. "How do you figure?"

"Well, I figured you'd be head-to-toe designer labels and diamonds," he confessed. "With a big-ass Prada bag or something…" He trailed off, clearly embarrassed.

She had to laugh. "With a Chihuahua peeking out?"

He grinned, and her stomach did a somersault. "Something like that."

Katie looked down at her jeans and Bob Marley T-shirt. "Sorry to disappoint you."

"Oh, no, not at all!" he exclaimed. "You look great…I mean, you look…Shit." His face turned bright, tomato-red, and Katie fought the urge to laugh out loud. "It's just that…I figured you'd be all fancy, but you're just…normal."

Katie decided to try to alleviate his obvious embarrassment. _A real lady does her best to put a gentleman at his ease, _said a voice in the back of her head. It sounded a lot like Miss Cavendish, one of her least favorite teachers at Heathrow. "Alfred would have a stroke if I walked out of the house dressed like a Hilton or something," she said. "But even he says there's nothing wrong with a designer label from time to time."

"Who's Alfred?" asked Jack. "Your…boyfriend?"

This time Katie did laugh out loud. "I'm sorry," she said. "Alfred is…well, I guess you would call him a guardian. He was my Uncle Thomas's butler, and he pretty much raised my cousin Bruce after his parents were killed."

Jack looked relieved, but tried not to show it. "I've heard about that," he said. "He and his wife were shot by a mugger or something, right?"

"That's right," Katie confirmed. "The guy was paroled a few years ago, but as he was leaving court somebody shot him."

"Poetic justice," Jack mused.

"That's what we all thought," she said gravely.

They sat in silence for a few minutes. Finally Jack said, "So Thomas Wayne was your uncle? You hear a lot about him in Gotham City, but I've never heard anything about a brother or sister."

Katie shrugged. "I'm not surprised. My dad, James, was a lot younger than Uncle Thomas, and from what I gather he was kind of a bad seed. He had a falling-out with my grandfather after he flunked out of college and got disinherited."

"Just for flunking out of college?"

"Well," Katie grinned, "it was the third one he'd flunked out of. And apparently he'd always nothing but trouble, so I guess it was the straw that broke the camel's back. The way Alfred tells it, I gather my grandfather was never exactly fond of my dad—my grandmother died giving birth to him, and I guess Grandfather Wayne blamed him for that." She decided not to mention the attack of conscience the old man had apparently suffered on his deathbed, which had led him to include a small—by Wayne standards, at least—provision in his will for the child of his prodigal son. People always assumed she had an inheritance coming, but then again she could have been living off the charity of her cousin Bruce. She thought it prudent to keep them guessing, just as a precaution against fortune-hunters. Not that Jack Napier seemed like that kind, but still…

He was saying something else. "And your parents? Where are they?"

"Dead," Katie said simply. "They died in a wreck when I was five." She also decided not to mention the fact that they had been drunk and fighting when they crashed—or that she had been in the backseat at the time. Only Alfred and Bruce knew that part. She had never been close enough to anyone else to talk about it.

"I'm sorry," Jack said sincerely, looking at her with those velvety brown eyes. Her stomach flip-flopped again. _Oh hell, _she thought. _I am _gone _over this guy._

"It was a long time ago," she responded—her standard answer whenever the subject was brought up. "Anyway, that's pretty much my family and my life story. So what about you? Where did you grow up? What's your family like?"

There was a certain understanding in those beautiful eyes as he responded. "I grew up in Atlantic City," he said. "My mom still lives there, and my dad took off when I was little so God only knows where he is now. I got into Gotham U on a scholarship."

"Any brothers or sisters?"

A shadow seemed to pass over his face. "I had a sister," he said quietly. "She died when I was twelve."

Impulsively, Katie reached across the table and put her hand over his. He let her. They sat like that for what seemed like hours. Finally he put his other hand over hers and said softly, "Thanks."

Suddenly he caught a glimpse of her watch. "Damn!" he swore. "I've got to be at work in twenty minutes."

"Where do you work?" she asked. Suddenly she couldn't shake the feeling that he was trying to get away. _Just my luck_, she moaned inwardly. _I finally meet someone who doesn't seem to see me as a walking dollar sign, and he wants to get away. _

"Campus bookstore," he said, rising quickly. "It sucks ass, but with the scholarship it just covers tuition." He hesitated. "Listen, Katie…" God, she loved the way he said her name!

"Would you like to get together tonight?" he asked in a rush. "I'm kind of broke right now, but they're showing _Citizen Kane _at the Student Union, and admission's free. I can spring for popcorn."

The sun broke through the clouds. The air filled with the sounds of an angel choir. At least that's how it felt to Katie. "I'd love to," she said, knowing she was grinning like a possum but unable to stop it. "I've never seen _Citizen Kane_."

"Great," he said. "It starts at eight so I'll pick you up around—seven? It'll take that long to find a parking space."

"Sounds good," she said. "I assume you know where I live?"

He kept a straight face. "I'll just look for the wrought-iron gate that says 'Wayne Manor'," he said solemnly.

It wasn't all that funny, but Katie laughed like it was the funniest thing she'd ever heard. The way she felt right then, it was.

"ALFRED!" Katie hollered as she burst into the foyer of Wayne Manor. "I'M HOME!"

Alfred Pennyworth, looking as formal and dignified as always, came down the stairs. "And how was your day, Miss Katherine?" he asked in his veddy proper British accent. He suspected it had gone well. Katie's cheeks were flushed, and her bright blue eyes sparkled. Always an attractive girl, right now she looked downright beautiful. As a matter of fact, Alfred mused, she looked uncannily like the portrait of her grandmother in the parlor—the portrait of the original Katherine Wayne.

"It was—" Katie struggled to find the right word—"fan-friggin'-tastic." She sighed dreamily.

Alfred stifled a smile. "I'm glad to hear that, Miss," he said dryly. "Will you be having lunch now?"

"In a little while," Katie replied, drifting towards the stairs. "I'm too excited to eat right now." She began a slow ascent to her room on the third floor. "Oh, Alfred," she called, pausing halfway up.

He popped right back into sight, though he'd already been in the next room. "Yes, Miss?"

"I have a date tonight. A young man named Jack Napier will be calling for me at about seven o'clock." Humming a little tune, Katie started back up the stairs.

"Very good, Miss," Alfred called, but there was a slight frown on his face. A young man. He should have guesses it immediately. He had been expecting it ever since the young miss finished at boarding school and came to Wayne Manor.

Miss Katherine seemed to be a mature, level-headed young woman, if a bit exuberant. And he knew she'd sniffed out her share of fortune hunters. But still…but still…

"Oh, Miss Katherine," he murmured. "Katie, be careful."


	2. Citizen Kane & Too Many Coronas

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER TWO

Katie spent the afternoon trying on and discarding pretty much every piece of clothing she owned.

First she tried on a pink-and-pale-blue flowered miniskirt with a pink tank top. She studied herself in the mirror and grimaced. "No," she said to her reflection. "It's _Citizen Kane_, not Sunday school."

Next she put on an outfit she'd loved in high school—fringed bell-bottom jeans and a blue peasant blouse. Nope. Wasn't gonna work either. She did her best Chong impression. "Like, wow, man," she drawled. "Far out."

She even tried on the jeans and T-shirt she'd been wearing, and added her leather jacket since nights were still a little cool. She knew immediately that that wouldn't do. "James Dean—James Dean—I know just what you mean," she sang out loud at the sight of herself.

She was on the verge of asking Alfred for the keys to the Lamborghini so she could go out and buy something when she spotted a possibility in the back of the closet. She had bought the white cotton sundress with multicolored embroidery around the neck and hem two years ago during one of her infrequent visits to Wayne Manor, worn it once—for a dinner party, if memory served—then hung it up and forgotten about it. Back then it had been a little big for her; now it fit perfectly. "Yeah," Katie muttered, nodding with approval at her reflection. "This will work." Her reflection agreed.

Katie was sitting at her dressing table doing the full kabuki—though trying to go for that natural, "oh-I-don't-even-wear-makeup" look—when heavy-metal music rent the air like a bomb. _"Nineteen sixty--fiiiive, yeah! Aw!_" screamed Rob Zombie. Katie jumped so hard she nearly stabbed herself in the eye with her mascara. "Shit!" she yelled. _I really need to change that damn ring tone. It scares the bejeezus out of me every time. _She lunged for the phone, wondered briefly who was calling—Jack?—didn't remember giving him her cell, wondered again who it was, and finally realized she ought to answer the damn thing and find out.

"Quick on the uptake" would never be inscribed on Katie Wayne's tombstone.

"Hello?" she said breathlessly, silently cursing whoever'd had the gall to interrupt her war paint application.

"Hello, is this Katie?" said a vaguely familiar voice. It was very precise, every word clearly enunciated, and youthful yet oddly formal. "This is Jonathan Crane."

Katie had to clap a hand over her mouth to keep from groaning out loud. Jonathan Crane. It figured.

Jonathan was in her Behavior and Experience class. He was a psych major, like her, and undoubtedly the smartest psych major at Gotham U. The other students referred to him as "the Professor"—when they weren't calling him other, nastier names. Jonathan Crane was eighteen going on fifty. He showed up for class every day in a suit and tie, and carried a briefcase rather than a backpack. Not only did the dude dress like a middle-aged businessman, he acted like one. More than one of his classmates had referred to him as an "officious, know-it-all prick", usually when he had corrected them about something in front of the entire class. He had even corrected their professor once. Professor Hinkle hadn't called him an officious, know-it-all prick, but Katie could tell he would have dearly loved to.

Jonathan had never corrected Katie, though. In fact, anytime she had something to say in class he always had some data or something to support whatever she was talking about. If she had said the moon was made of green cheese, he would have presented scientific evidence to back her up. He had never had positive feedback for anyone else, and their classmates ribbed her good-naturedly about "Scarecrow's" crush on her.

It was actually kind of a shame, Katie reflected. He was actually quite an attractive guy. He was tall and lanky—hence the Scarecrow nickname—but he had very nice dark brown hair and classically handsome features, and the most amazing ice-blue eyes. If he would just lose the old-man 'tude and wardrobe, he would be a total chick magnet. Katie was always pleasant to him, but there was something about him she found off-putting, other than the obvious. He was just so—_controlled._ He never seemed to show any emotion. Whether he actually had deep feelings that he kept repressed, or was in fact as flat as he seemed, she couldn't figure out, but he seemed like the kind of guy who might just suddenly bring a gun to school and go on a rampage one day.

Then, too, there was the money factor. Although he had never alluded to it, Katie knew he knew good and damn well that she was in fact _that _Wayne. The Crane family moved in the same circles as the Waynes in Gotham society, and her friend Lexi Fox had told her that Jonathan's mother was "an insufferable social climber" who was constantly after Jonathan to "make a good match". Katie thought that part of Jonathan's crush on her stemmed from the fact that Mama Crane would undoubtedly view the Wayne heiress as "a good match". All in all, Katie had no interest in dating Jonathan Crane.

So it was with little enthusiasm that she replied, "Hey, Jonathan. What's up?"

"I was just wondering if you needed to borrow my notes from today," he said. He was always offering to let her do this. She had never taken him up on it, though she had been sorely tempted to a few times.

"No, I think I'm good," she told him. "Thanks for asking, though. I may have to take you up on it soon, though. The next chapter is supposed to be a lot more difficult."

"It's no big deal. I've read it already," he bragged. _Imagine that, _Katie thought. "But if you start having trouble with it, I'll be glad to help you out. We can even study together, if you like."

"Great," Katie said cheerfully, pantomiming stabbing herself through the heart. _You're such a bitch, Katie Wayne, _she told herself. Then, _Hell, at least I'm nice to him. Most people treat him like shit to his face. _Meanwhile, seven o'clock was fast approaching. "Well, Jonathan—"

"Katie, would you like to go out tonight?" Jonathan said in a rush. "_Citizen Kane _is showing at the Student Union, and I thought we might…" He faltered.

_Well, shit. _Jonathan Crane had finally worked up the courage to ask her out, and she was going to have to try to let him down easy. An hour before a date she was looking forward to, no less. _Stone the crows._ She smiled a little at the apt reference.

"I'm actually already going, Jonathan," she said, trying to sound kind but not pitying and doing a fair job. "But hey, if you're going too we'll probably run into each other." _And you'll see me with a date and hopefully back off, _she silently added.

If he was disappointed, he did an admirable job of hiding it. "Undoubtedly," he responded in what she thought of as his "Professor" tone. 'Well, it was good speaking with you, Katie. I expect I'll see you in class tomorrow."

_I expect you will. _"Bye, Jonathan."

After hanging up she just sat there for a minute, mulling over this development.

"Jonathan Crane," she said out loud, "if you would just start acting your age and get your head out of your ass, I'd probably already be going out with you. If someone else hadn't already beaten me to it, anyway."

Then she went back to her makeup.

Jack Napier stood in the foyer of Wayne Manor looking as though he didn't know whether to shit or go blind. From her vantage point at the top of the stairs she watched with amusement as he took in the marble floor scattered with Aubusson rugs, the gargantuan crystal chandelier, and the priceless _objets d'art _gathered on equally priceless Louis XVI tables. _I might not be quite what he expected, _she thought wryly, _but by God I bet this place is._

"Hi, Jack!" she said brightly, coming down the stairs. _God, please don't let me trip_, she prayed as she minced along gingerly in her Steve Madden platforms.

Relief spread over his face as he saw her—relief mixed with masculine appreciation. "Hey, Katie," he said.

"You've met Alfred, I presume," she said, gesturing to the omnipresent butler. "Alfred, this is Jack Napier. I met him today at the university. Jack, meet Alfred, the Wayne family guardian angel."

"A pleasure, Mr. Napier," Alfred said, bowing slightly.

"Nice to meet you," Jack said, once again looking a little dazed at the grandeur of it all.

"Well, shall we head out?" Katie asked. She could tell he was getting uncomfortable. Alfred wore his usual inscrutable expression, but he had that line between his brows he got when he was thinking hard.

"You'll need a jacket, Miss Katherine," he said. "It's getting quite chilly out there." He already had her light spring coat draped over one arm, and proffered it to her. She took it and began to shrug it on when Jack stepped up behind her and took it.

"Here, let me," he said, helping her into it.

He was standing right behind her, his warm breath on her neck, his hands on her, she could smell his aftershave—Katie imagined the headlines: "**GOTHAM SOCIALITE HAS SCREAMING ORGASMIC FIT IN FRONT OF HORRIFIED BUTLER, DATE**." She choked down on a giggle so hard she nearly gave herself a slipped disc, coughing quickly to cover it up.

"Thank you," she said, smiling back at him. Alfred, she was pleased to notice, wore a look of guarded approval following Jack's gentlemanly gesture.

Jack's car was a Trans Am that looked like it had seen its best days sometime during the Reagan administration. "Excuse this piece of shit," he apologized as he opened the passenger door for her. "I haven't had much time to clean it out lately."

"That's all right," Katie said as she got in, brushing a couple of fast-food bags out of the seat. "We weren't allowed to have cars at my boarding school. I'm still at the point where I think any car is pretty damn cool."

"Do you drive?" he asked as he got in and started the car. The engine sputtered ominously, then came reluctantly to life.

"I have my license, but I haven't gotten to do a whole lot of driving," she said as they headed into the city. "Not being able to have a car at school I mainly learned how on vacations or when I went home with friends on the weekends. I take my cousin's Lamborghini out sometimes, but he kind of frowns on that. He wired Alfred some money a couple weeks ago and told him to find me a quote 'suitable vehicle'. But we haven't had a lot of time to look yet."

"Your cousin doesn't live in Gotham, right?" Jack inquired.

"No, Bruce is on what Alfred calls a globe-trotting phase. Last we heard he was somewhere in Asia. He calls to check in every so often, though."

"You two aren't close, I take it?"

Katie thought a minute before she answered. "Not exactly," she said slowly. "He's a lot older, for one thing—he was getting ready to start college when my parents died. I don't think Alfred knew quite what to do with a six-year-old girl, so they enrolled me at Heathrow. I didn't visit Wayne Manor much. I went to camp most summers, or stayed with friends. When I came here for holidays and stuff Bruce was always nice, but he was always busy with the company. And now, of course, he's gone. So no," she concluded, "Bruce has always been good to me, but I wouldn't say we were close."

Jack was silent for a minute, and Katie wondered at herself. Normally she was intensely private about her family life, or lack thereof. It wasn't like her to go into detail about the inner workings of the House of Wayne (and Pennyworth). What was it about Jack Napier that made her want to spill her guts?

Finally he broke the silence. "I noticed you were wearing a Bob Marley shirt today," he said. "Do you listen to a lot of reggae?"

That broke the ice and opened up a much lighter avenue of conversation. They chatted about music, movies, and TV until before Katie knew it they were parking.

"Jack, wait," she said before they got out of the car. "I need to ask you something."

He raised an eyebrow quizzically—somehow it made him look even more adorable, if that was possible. "Shoot."

Katie took a deep breath. "Well…is knowing what 'Rosebud' is going to ruin the movie for me?"

Jack looked at her blankly for a minute. Then comprehension dawned in his eyes as he burst out laughing.

"What's so damn funny?" she asked, a little perturbed.

"You," he replied when he could talk. "You looked so serious; I thought you were going to ask me some earth-shattering question. I should have known it would be something off-the-wall like that. You're an odd character, Katie Wayne."

"Is that a compliment?" Katie asked, so she would know whether to be pleased or get pissy.

"It is," he assured her. "It most definitely is. And to answer your question, no, I don't think it'll ruin the movie for you."

And it didn't. When the lights came up Katie understood why _Citizen Kane _was considered one of the greatest films of all time. "I love it," she bubbled as they left the student union. "All that money, all that success, he had everything people dream about…and he died thinking of the only happy time in his life, when he was little and poor."

He smiled down at her. "I'm glad you enjoyed it," he said. As they walked out into the chilly spring night she casually slipped her hand into his. They both acted like they didn't notice.

Katie didn't want the night to end. Apparently Jack didn't either. "Are you hungry?" he asked.

Actually, she was. The popcorn they'd bought before the movie was now a distant memory, and her stomach was making some interesting sounds. But even if she'd been stuffed to the gills Katie would have said yes.

"One of my roommates works at Guido's—you know, that pizza place on the next street? I helped him pass a test last week, and he owes me a free pie. How 'bout it?"

"Sounds great," Katie said truthfully. It did. She couldn't decide which was the best part of the plan—a hot, cheesy, greasy Guido's pizza or sitting in a cozy booth with Jack Napier.

Guido's was packed as usual. It looked like everyone who'd been at _Citizen Kane _had had the same idea as them. They stood waiting for a table, nodding and smiling at people they knew. Katie was relieved not to see Jonathan Crane anywhere, although she really couldn't picture him hanging at Guido's anyway. She hadn't seen him at the movie either (although, unbeknownst to her, he had been sitting in the back row the entire time, his eyes fixed on her and on Jack's arm draped casually around her shoulders).

Finally a booth opened up, and they lunged for it. A waiter approached them. "Jack, my man!" he said. "You come to collect your free pie?" He spotted Katie and grinned. "And who's this lovely lady?"

"Back off, Alex," Jack rejoined. "She's way too good for the likes of you. Katie, this goober is Alex Martinez, my roommate. I save his ass academically on a regular basis, and he pays me in pizza. Alex, this is Katie. We literally ran into each other on the Quad this morning."

"You gotta stop mowing people down like that, Napier," Alex kidded. "Good thing you drive better than you walk, or they'd have revoked your license for life by now. Then again," he smiled at Katie, "if you were in my path I'd probably have done the same thing. Well, what can I get you two to drink?"

"I'll have a Bud," Jack said. "Katie, what would you like? Everyone Alex knows is automatically twenty-one when they're in here"—he winked—"or you can have a soda or something if you'd rather."

"I think I'd like a Corona, actually," she said.

"Italian food and Mexican beer—an unbeatable combination," Alex said. "You want lime?" She nodded.

They ordered a large pie with extra cheese, pepperoni, and mushrooms. Alex took their order to the front and returned with their beers and an order of breadsticks. "On the house," he said. "By the way, Jack, I have a term paper coming up…"

"Surprise, surprise, surprise!" Jack did his best Gomer Pyle. "You know I'll help you with it," he said. "Don't I always? Thanks for the sticks."

Katie took a swallow of her Corona. "There's nothing as good as the first drink of a cold beer,' she remarked.

"Truer words were never spoken," said Jack. "I have to say, though, I didn't figure you for the drinking type. I thought girls from boarding schools were pretty sheltered from stuff like that."

Katie laughed. "That's the myth," she said. "In reality everyone was always smoking in the johns and had a bottle of whiskey or something hidden in their sock drawers. We used to have some crazy middle-of-the-night parties. Then, too, everyone ran wild at home on weekends and holidays. We boarding-school girls aren't what people think."

"I guess it just goes to show," Jack said. "There's always a way around the rules, no matter how strict."

"Katie!" squealed a familiar voice.

Katie looked up. "Lexi!" she squealed back, jumping up to hug the girl who stood at their table.

Alexandra Fox's father, Lucius, was one of Wayne Enterprises' oldest and most trusted employees. In addition, the Fox and Wayne families had been friends for decades. Lexi, two years older than Katie, had often been drafted to have "play dates" with the younger girl on the rare occasions she was at Wayne Manor. From these enforced get-togethers a friendship had sprung, and now that the two girls were both living in Gotham and attending the university, they had become increasingly close. Lexi, a tall, striking dead ringer for Beyonce, was studying fashion design and marketing.

Katie introduced her friend to Jack, and the three chatted for a minute, comparing majors and groaning about professors. When Jack excused himself to go to the men's room, Lexi grabbed Katie's arm. "Oh my God, where did you find him?" she whispered. "He is fine as wine!"

"Don't I know it," Katie replied, a trifle smugly. "I crashed into him this morning after class. He picked me up, dusted me off and then invited me for coffee." She added, unnecessarily, "I really like him."

"No shit," Lexi said. "You're glowing. Does he know…" she hesitated.

"That I'm _that _Wayne?" Katie finished. "Yeah, he figured it out over coffee. He doesn't seem to care one way or the other, though."

Lexi got serious. "Be careful, Katie," she warned. "I know you like him, and he seems really nice, but still…"

"I'm gonna be careful, Lex," Katie answered. "I have a good feeling about this one, though. God knows I've run into my share of guys who were just into my money and my name. I don't get that vibe off of Jack at all."

"I'm probably just being paranoid," Lexi said. "He seems really into you. I just don't want to see you get hurt."

"I'm not going to get hurt, Lex," Katie promised. _I hope._

Lexi's boyfriend approached and tugged at her arm. "Call me later," she tossed over her shoulder. A moment later, Jack arrived back at the table just as Alex showed up with their pizza and more beers.

The evening got hazy for Katie right about then. She only had brief flashes of memory about the rest of that night: the table littered with bottles (Jack later told her she chugged five beers in quick succession, which doesn't sound like much until you consider that Katie was five-one, 110 pounds and not used to drinking on a regular basis). Stumbling as Jack led her out of Guido's, and when he reached to steady her falling a little more heavily against him than she really needed to. Singing (loudly and not very well) along with the classic-rock station on the car radio. She was later mortified to discover she had not only sung Steve Miller Band's "The Joker" in its entirety, she had done her own version of the famous wolf-whistle synthesizer in the first and last verses. Jack looking amused, laughing out loud a few times, pulling in at a convenience store and coming out a minute later with a cup of hot coffee, urging her to drink it. "I can't take you back to Wayne Manor like this," he said, holding the cup to her lips. 'That Alfred guy looks like he'd plant a foot in my ass if I brought you back there wasted."

Katie laughed like a hyena. She was at that stage of drunkenness where everything was just hilarious. "He probably would," she howled. "And never change expression while he was doing it!"

The last thing she remembered was letting her head fall back against the seat and closing her eyes for just a minute. Jack's voice seemed very far away: "Yeah, that's probably not a bad idea. Just rest for a little while." Katie decided to take his advice.

When she opened her eyes again, the rosy-fingered dawn was just breaking over the drab gray skyline of Gotham. Her head ached, her neck was stiff and her mouth felt like a wad of cotton. _Where am I? _she thought fuzzily.

Then it hit her: she was in Jack Napier's car, sleeping off a drunk, after getting totally shitfaced on her date with the guy. And Jack Napier himself sat in the leaned-back driver's seat, sleeping angelically and snoring like a buzz saw. Katie fought the urge to reach out and touch that exquisite face even as she snickered at the snoring.

He must have sensed her watching him, because the lovely brown eyes fluttered open. "Morning," he said sleepily.

"Morning," Katie replied.

"How are you feeling?" he asked, somewhat wryly.

"Not too bad," she said, which wasn't a total lie—at least she wasn't puking. "I think maybe I drank a little too much."

He laughed. "I think maybe you're right."

"Was I bad?" she asked, dreading the answer.

"No, you were OK," he reassured her. "I got you out of Guido's before you got really wily. You stumbled as we were leaving, but it looked like you tripped on your shoe or something. You did a concert for me before you passed out, though."

"I sang?"

"You sang," he confirmed. "I particularly enjoyed your sound effects on 'The Joker'. It's nice to run across another Steve Miller fan."

"Oh, Jesus," Katie moaned, dropping her head into her hands.

"No, no, it was cute," he insisted. "At least you didn't hurl in the car or anything."

"Well, you're lucky." Her head was still in her hands so her voice was muffled. "It's been known to happen in the past."

He was silent for a long time. Finally he spoke. His voice was surprisingly gentle.

"Do you do this kind of thing often, Katie?"

"No," she answered quickly. "I try not to drink if I can help it, until last night I hadn't had a drink since I left Heathrow three months ago. I don't drink often, but when I _do_ drink it's like I can't stop—I have to keep drinking more and more and more. I don't know why. God knows I should be the last person in the world to drink. My parents…" She trailed off. _Katie! What the fuck are you doing? You've never told anyone this, and now you're getting ready to spill it to some guy you haven't even known twenty-four hours!_

Jack reached over and gently pried her hands from her face. He held her chin in one hand and both of her hands in the other. "I want to tell you two things," he said quietly. "I want to get them out in the open right now, and then we don't have to discuss them anymore. The first thing is, I know what happened to your parents. I Googled your father's name and found out all about the accident. I know they were drunk. I know your mom hit your dad and he ran off the road into a tree. I know you were in the backseat and saw them both die. So I'd say if anyone had a reason to drink to excess it would be you. But I also want you to consider that both of your parents apparently had drinking problems, and it usually goes down through the genes. I think it would be wise of you to quit drinking totally now, while it's just an occasional thing for you.

"Now. The second thing I want to tell you is this. I told you I had a sister who died"—Katie nodded—"but I didn't tell you how. She was murdered."

Katie was speechless for a minute. "My God," she said finally. "Jack, that's terrible! Did they ever find who did it?"

He smiled, but it was a small, bitter grin completely unlike the other smiles she'd seen on his face. "Oh, we knew who it was all along," he said. "It was her boyfriend. He'd abused her for years, and he always said he'd kill her if she ever tried to leave him. Well, she did finally leave him, and a few days after she broke it off with him he came into the store where she was working and…shot her." He swallowed. "Just walked in there and blew her brains out. Shot the girl she was working with, too. She lived, though." He closed his eyes, apparently reliving the horrible memories.

"Well, I hope they fried his ass," Katie said vehemently.

Jack shook his head. "He was never even arrested. He was a dealer, so he had all kinds of people who were glad to hide him out and help him escape justice." He smiled faintly. "It turned out OK, though. The shithead apparently pissed off somebody major—not small-time dealers like him. They found him tortured to death in an abandoned building a few weeks after he killed my sister." The smile faded. "I thought that would make me feel good, and it did, for a little while. But it didn't bring my sister back."

"What was your sister's name?" Katie asked softly.

He closed his eyes again. "Lily," he said with difficulty. "Her name was Lily."

"That's a beautiful name," Katie said kindly.

"She was beautiful. She was five years older than me. Our mom worked all the time after my dad left, so Lily usually looked after me. She practically raised me." He added, almost in a whisper, "Sometimes I still can't believe she's gone."

Katie lunged across the seat and grabbed him so hard in a hug she could hear the breath go out of him. "Hey," he said when he realized she was crying into his shoulder. "Hey, don't cry. I didn't mean to make you cry." He rocked her a little. "I just wanted to let you know that I understand. I know how it feels." He didn't realize that that was exactly _why _she was crying. She had only ever met one other person who knew the kind of grief she'd experienced—her older cousin, Bruce. And they had never shared their feelings like this.

"Katie, Katie," Jack was saying softly. He took her face in his hands and wiped the tears from it with his thumbs, thoroughly, like a mother cat cleaning a kitten. They gazed into each other's faces, warm brown eyes meeting bluish-gray. Almost as if he were in a trance, Jack bent forward and kissed her lightly on the lips.

That seemed to break the spell. He pulled away, obviously startled. "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't plan that at all. It just sort of…happened."

Katie smiled. "That's OK. I didn't mind." And she didn't. "To be perfectly honest, I've been hoping you would do that ever since yesterday morning."

He smiled back at her. "That's a coincidence," he said. "Because I've been wanting to do that since yesterday morning." He started the car. "But now I'd better get you home before Alfred puts an APB out on both of us."

She laughed. "He's not that overprotective," she protested.

"Oh, really?" Jack deadpanned. "I think he might be. That's good, though. I can tell he cares about you a lot."

"He does," Katie confirmed, vaguely surprised that she'd never realized it before. "He used to come to Parents' Weekends and stuff at Heathrow, and when I graduated he and some of Wayne Enterprises' employees came with their families so I'd have a bunch of people cheering for me like the other girls."

"You're lucky to have someone like him," Jack told her.

"Yes," she agreed. "Yes, I am."

When they arrived at Wayne Manor, Katie looked at Jack apprehensively. "Am I going to see you again?" she asked. "I haven't scared you off, have I?"

He looked at her so seriously that she winced, sure he was getting ready to say _you're a nice girl, Katie, but…_

"As long as you don't spew in my car," he said gravely, "I think we can make this thing work."

Katie burst out laughing and threw her arms around him again. He returned her embrace.

"Go in and get some rest, Katie Wayne," he whispered in her ear. "You'll definitely be hearing from me again."

Alfred was waiting in the foyer. He looked as starched and immaculate as ever, but his face was ashen and there were dark circles under his eyes.

"Miss Katherine," he said with obvious relief. "Thank God. I was beginning to worry."

"I'm sorry," Katie said. "We were just having such a great time that we didn't want to end. I didn't mean to worry you." Alfred was no fool; he could probably tell she'd been drinking, but since she was home sober, in one piece and obviously happy he probably wouldn't mention it.

And he didn't. "I called the school and told them you wouldn't be in today," he said. "Miss Fox will be bringing your assignments to you this afternoon. Mind you, I won't do that every time, but just this once—"

"Thank you, Alfred," Katie said. "And don't worry; there isn't going to be a next time."

Alfred nodded. "I'm glad to hear that, Miss. And now I would be heading up to bed if I were you."

"That's exactly where I'm headed," Katie assured him. She started up the stairs, and stopped halfway up just as she had the previous day. He was still standing in the foyer this time.

"Alfred," she said hesitantly, not sure exactly what to say. "Thank you. For taking care of me. For taking care of all of us Waynes."

He didn't crack a smile; but she would never know how deeply this little speech pleased him. "It's what I do, Miss."

**A/N: Whew! Sorry if this chapter seems a little long, but what can I say--I have "Stephen King Syndrome." Siriuswriter, I'm glad you liked the first chappie and I hope you liked this one. If anyone's worried about Katie being too Mary Sue and/or Jack being too OOC (at least considering that we all know who he becomes), never fear. Darker times are headed for Jack-and-Katie Land.**


	3. Coney Island

Three Months Later

**A/N: Sorry it took so long, but I'm finally updating! Hope this chappie is worth the wait. I changed the rating just to be on the safe side, I don't think it's too terribly graphic but opinions vary on that sort of thing. Please review, and tell me if I'm doing a good job on what my high school creative-writing teacher called "effective foreshadowing." Also let me know if Katie's coming off as a Mary Sue, I'm trying my best to make her seem real but let me know if I need to try harder.**

_Three Months Later_

Katie woke up early for the first time since classes had ended the last week of May. For the first time in her memory, she also woke up smiling and ready to start the day. But then it was a doubly special day: not only was it her eighteenth birthday, it was also her and Jack's three-month anniversary. They were going to spend the day at Coney Island—Jack's idea when he found out Katie had never been there. "You've lived this close to it for the last twelve years and never been?" he had asked incredulously a couple of weeks earlier. "That should be illegal! We're going to have to do something about that."

The last three months had been the happiest time of Katie's life. She and Jack had been practically joined at the hip for most of it. On their full class days and the days Jack had to work, they would at least manage to meet for coffee; on their short days and especially on the weekends, they were together practically every waking minute. Jack had become somewhat used to the splendor of Wayne Manor, and his roommates, Alex and Darren, jokingly referred to Katie as "our fourth roommate" because she was at the apartment so much. They went to movies and concerts; they went bowling and shot pool and played darts (which Jack had an uncanny talent for). They spent hours at Noah's Arcade just off campus, where Jack played the video games for hours on end and Katie earned the nickname "Skee-Ball Wizard". Once in a while they would go on a group date with Alex and Darren and their revolving girlfriends, or Lexi Fox and her long-time boyfriend Thad Marshall, but mostly it was just the two of them. Katie loved every minute they spent together, but her favorite times (and, she suspected, Jack's as well) were when it was just them at the apartment or Wayne Manor, either ordering dinner in or attempting to cook it themselves, then settling down for a quiet evening of TV and cuddling.

Katie bounced out of bed and tore around her room singing at the top of her lungs. "_Some people call me the space cowboy, yeah, some call me the gangster of love,_" she bellowed as she rooted through the closet for something to wear. They thought of this as "their song" now. She decided on a simple pale-blue cami and khaki capris for the day's excursion. Her hair was doing its white-girl-'fro thing, so she skinned it back in a ponytail. She decided not to fool with makeup other than a little lipstick and mascara, and of course sunscreen. Through trial and error she had discovered that Jack actually liked her best plain and unadorned—just the way she'd been when he first saw her.

She was excited about going to Coney Island, but the main thought in her head was: _Will _this _be the day? _After three months, she and Jack still hadn't consummated their relationship. They had had some pretty hot and heavy makeout sessions, but so far they'd always stopped just short of what her Heathrow classmates had referred to as "the Dirty Deed". Surprisingly, it was usually Jack who called a halt to the proceedings. "It's not the right time," he kept saying. "We need to be really sure of this thing before we take it to the next level."

"Maybe he's impotent," Lexi had suggested, only half-joking, when Katie was venting to her about Jack's unwavering gentlemanliness. But Katie immediately discounted that theory. She'd felt the bulge in his jeans enough times. She knew he wanted her as much as she wanted him. And it seemed like it was getting harder for him to wait, too. Last week they'd been on her bed and he'd been on top of her, and he had reached into her shorts and acted like he wanted to pull them off. She thought it was really going to happen that time, but just as she'd raised her hips to make it easier for him he had pulled away from her. "Not here, baby," he said. "Not now."

"Where, then?" Katie had cried impatiently. "When?"

"Soon," he had responded. "When it's right, we'll both know it." But so far that glorious day hadn't arrived. And here she was, old enough to vote now and probably the last remaining virgin in America. Not that she hadn't had plenty of chances.The guys who had panted after the Wayne name and fortune would all have been happy to give her a tumble, and many had tried. She supposed even old Scarecrow Crane would have liked to get into her pants if he'd had the opportunity. But none of those dudes had tempted her in the slightest. She had held out for someone who at least cared about her as a person, not just her supposed wealth. And now she had found him, and she was ready and willing to let him deflower her, and apparently he cared so much that he was never going to. Well, maybe today would be the day. It was her birthday, after all.

"Miss Katherine?" Alfred's voice crackled through the intercom.

"Yo," she replied cheerfully.

"Mr. Napier is here." Alfred's voice sounded kind of funny—even more restrained than usual—but she figured it was just the intercom.

When she entered the foyer, however, she was greeted by an unusual sight. Jack and Alfred stood side by side in the foyer, both grinning from ear to ear. They had become cordial over the last few months, but hardly buddy-buddy. Katie's suspicion was aroused.

"Happy birthday, baby!" Jack exclaimed.

"Yes, Miss Katherine," Alfred seconded quickly. "Happy birthday."

"Thank you," she said. "Now what's going on, you two?"

"Not a thing," Jack assured her, a little too hastily. "Are you ready to roll?"

"You know it," Katie said. She strode to the front door, opened it, and screamed so loudly that the men winced.

In the driveway sat a gorgeous, candy-apple-red Mercedes convertible with an enormous white bow perched on top. "Oh, my God," Katie gasped. She spun around. "Alfred…"

"Master Bruce also wishes to convey birthday greetings," Alfred said formally, but his eyes danced with merriment at her obvious delight.

Katie squealed and threw her arms around him, catching him by surprise and nearly causing him to lose his balance. "Well…ahem," he said, obviously embarrassed. She laughed and moved on to Jack, throwing her arms around him as well.

"Hey," Jack laughed. "Don't hug me. I had nothing to do with it."

"I don't care!" Katie exclaimed. "This is the best birthday ever!" She turned to Alfred. "I'll email Bruce and thank him as soon as I get home."

"He'll appreciate that, I'm sure," the butler replied. "Now, I suggest you two—what do you call it—take her for a spin. The keys are in the ignition."

She needed no more encouragement. She ran to the car like her feet were on fire and her ass was catching. "Come on, Jack!" she hollered.

He came, still laughing. "I figured you'd be excited," he said as he reached the car. "How did I ever guess?"

"You rat," Katie said. "How long have you known about this?"

He smiled. "Alfred might have mentioned something about it a couple of weeks ago."

"And you didn't tell me." Katie pretended to pout, then broke into a huge grin. "Oh well, I guess I'll forgive you." She opened the door, then paused. "Do you want to drive?"

"Of course not," he said. "It's your car; you should be the first to drive it." He grinned. "I'll drive it back tonight."

"Done," she said, and got in.

--

They drove to Coney Island with the top down the whole way, with the radio blasting the classic-rock station they both liked, laughing hysterically and singing at the top of their lungs. This was definitely shaping up to be the best day ever, Katie decided.

When they parked and put the top up, Jack turned to her. "I have something for you, too," he said almost shyly. "It's not much, but I hope you like it." He handed her a small black velvet jewelry box with a red ribbon tied around it.

For one heart-stopping second Katie thought he was giving her an engagement ring. When she opened it to find not a ring, but a necklace, relief and disappointment waged a brief battle inside her. As she looked at the necklace, though, both relief and disappointment vanished and happiness took their place. "Jack," she said. "I love it!"

And she did. It was nothing fancy—a small turquoise heart on a slim silver chain—but Katie had always had simple taste in jewelry for a rich girl. The necklace was something she would have chosen for herself. And hey, the fact that he was giving her jewelry was a good sign, even if it wasn't a ring. It was a little early yet for that, anyway.

"I'm glad," he said. "It belonged to Lily." He cleared his throat. "My mom gave it to her for her Sweet Sixteen, and she never took it off until…" He trailed off and then cleared his throat. "Well. Anyway. I wanted to give you something that meant something to me. Do you really like it?"

She was struggling to put it on. "It's beautiful," she said. "I already loved it; knowing it belonged to your sister only makes me appreciate it more." She couldn't seem to get the clasp done. "Here, help me with it."

He leaned over and clasped it easily. But he lingered a moment with his hand on her neck and his face close to hers. She could feel his warm breath on her cheek.

It was all too perfect for words. So of course she had to fuck it up. "I love you, Jack," she blurted.

He pulled away abruptly and stared at her, his expression unreadable. She felt herself reddening. _Shit, _she thought. _Me and my fucking mouth. I can just hear the teachers at Heathrow: "A lady never tells a gentleman she loves him unless he has said it first." Miss Cavendish would be tickled. She always said I was uncouth._

He cleared his throat again. She fought a wild urge to offer him a cough drop. "I…I care about you a lot, Katie," he said.

She was able to summon up her dignity. "I'm glad to hear it," she said, "and that's all you have to say for now." She smiled. "Now, come on. Show me what I've been missing all these years by not coming to Coney Island."

As they walked through the parking garage he put his arm around her—his silent way of telling her she hadn't fucked up _too _badly, and maybe not at all. She smiled and touched the heart nestled in the hollow of her throat. _I'll never take this off, _she vowed silently. And for a very, very long time, she didn't.

--

It was an almost eerily perfect day. Under a cloudless sky, in warm weather with just enough a breeze to keep it from being stiflingly hot, Jack introduced Katie to the joys of Coney Island. They hit Astroland and Deno's, and rode nearly every ride each had to offer, as well as several independent attractions. At Katie's request they went through all three haunted houses on the island (she was a haunted-house freak). They rode the Cyclone (one of the oldest wooden coasters still operating in America) four times. They played bumper cars at Astroland until they were both sore.

They stopped riding just long enough to consume a foot-long hot dog and a bag of cotton candy apiece, then headed directly to the nearest Tilt-A-Whirl. Katie just barely managed to keep her food down; Jack wasn't so lucky, and had to run for a trash can as soon as the ride ended. They decided maybe it was time to cool it on the rides for a while, and went to get airbrushed tattoos. She got a huge one of some kind of snarling black jungle cat ("a hellcat," Jack said). It looked totally out of place on her slender, delicate arm, which was of course exactly why she'd chosen it. She couldn't wait to show Alfred; he was going to shit. Jack got a small, vaguely sinister-looking tat of a joker in a deck of cards. After they were temporarily inked, they went to the Eldorado arcade. Katie established her reputation as the Skee-Ball wizard there, while Jack did well enough on the video games to win her a giant, hideous stuffed bear of a Pepto-Bismol hue. Jack, Katie, and the ugly bear couldn't resist just one spin in the indoor bumper cars at the Eldorado.

As they were getting ready to leave they stopped to play a game of "Shoot the Freak," where they got to shoot paintballs at a human target. Katie cringed every time she hit the poor guy, but Jack seemed to relish it. He was damn good at it too. They wound up the day with one last ride on the Cyclone.

It was full dark by the time they got back to the car. They were both exhausted, sweaty, slightly queasy, sunburned and happy.

"_That's _what you've been missing," Jack told her as they got in the car.

"My God," she cried dramatically, rolling her eyes heavenward, "what a fool I've been."

"Smartass," he responded, grinning. "I take it you had a good time?"

"Yes," Katie said fervently. "Let's go back tomorrow."

He laughed. "We'll try to come back a couple times before the summer's over," he promised. He started the car. "Your place or mine, love?"

"Yours," she said, leaning her head back against the seat. _I'll take a nap on the way home, _she thought, _so I'll be all rested and ready to work my feminine wiles on you, Jack Napier. _Smiling and clutching the ugly bear, she was asleep before they left the parking lot.

--

The apartment was empty. _Thank you, Alex and Darren, _Katie said silently. "Well," Jack said as they stood in the living room, "what do you want to do now?"

She didn't hesitate. "You."

He cracked up at that. "You're a pree-vert, you know that?" he said, imitating one of the janitors at Gotham U who had stumbled across them dry-humping in an abandoned stairwell. "You look like Miss Sweet and Innocent, but you've got the mind of a frat boy."

"I know," she said, unabashed. "I'm serious, though. Let's do it. Let's bump uglies."

He got serious. "Katie," he said, "what have I been telling you about the right time and place?"

"You said we'd both know it when it happened," she retorted, "and you said it would be soon. That was a week ago."

He sighed. "I did say that, didn't I?"

"You did," she confirmed. "To quote the Smiths, 'How Soon Is Now'? _I am hyooo-man and I need to be looooved, _" she warbled, "_just like everybody else dooooes._ So do it, Jack," she urged. "Love me." She couldn't believe she was egging him on like this, but she couldn't seem to stop. It was like she had to make something happen.

And she was wearing him down, she could tell. He ran his hand through his hair impatiently and sighed again. "Ah, damn it, Katie," he huffed.

She got a great idea. "Turn around and close your eyes," she told him. Surprisingly, he obeyed. She shucked out of her capris and halter as quickly as she could. "OK," she said. "You can turn around now."

He did, only to behold her wearing nothing but a black lace bra that barely covered what it should, a matching pair of bikinis, and a smile. "Jesus, Katie," he exclaimed. "The blinds are open! What are you doing?" Even as he rebuked her his hands flew to his crotch, trying unsuccessfully to hide a sudden massive cockstand.

She giggled. "Well, I guess we better go in your room then," she said.

He swallowed hard. "I guess we better."

In his room she began to perform a bump-and-grind striptease, but stumbled over a shoe. "Shit," she said as she steadied herself. "Oh, fuck it," she said, giving up the striptease and just pulling her lingerie off. "Come on, Jack. Come give me my birthday wish." She licked her lips slowly, loving the mingled annoyance and lust on his face. "You know you want to," she whispered.

Lust took over. He crossed the room swiftly and took her in his arms. Oh, Christ, she felt wonderful. He held her at arm's length and simply admired her for a moment. She was no centerfold. She was barely five feet tall, and had smallish breasts and a butt that was rather on the large side. But the breasts were perfectly shaped and perky, and he liked big butts, and she had a tiny waist and a flat stomach and slender, shapely legs, and all in all she was a glorious female specimen. The thought flitted across his mind: _She must go to a tanning bed, she doesn't have any lines, and somehow I can't see her lying nude by the pool at Wayne Manor—_

--and then her arms were entwined around him and her body was pressed firmly against his own, and he couldn't protest because she was kissing his mouth, so he raised his hands to push her away but somehow they got tangled in her hair instead, pulling it free of its ponytail, and then all thought left him and he pushed her back onto the bed and fell on her with a low moan, and her fingers were scrabbling at his fly and then he was free, and he slipped himself between her thighs and she was ready for him, all soft and silky-wet, and oh God he was more than ready for _her_, and he plunged into her with a hoarse cry.

Katie couldn't stifle a small cry as Jack entered her, driving into her tight, resisting flesh which tore and bled. The girls at Heathrow had been right, it hurt like hell. She whimpered a little, hating herself even as she did, thinking _don't be such a wuss, Katie Wayne, every woman since Eve has made it through this—_

"Don't cry, baby," Jack pleaded, still thrusting. He kissed her tear-streaked face. "It gets better, I promise it does. It gets better and better and—"Suddenly he reared back and gasped. For one horrified moment Katie thought he was having a heart attack or something, then felt him twitching inside her and realized he was coming. _I must have done something right_, she thought, not without satisfaction.

"My God," he panted, rolling off of her and staring at the ceiling. "My God." He propped his head on his hand and gazed at her. "Are you OK?"

"I—yeah, I think so," Katie said shakily.

He looked deep into her eyes for a long moment, then sat up, scooped her into his arms and cradled her against him. "I'm sorry, baby," he whispered. "I didn't mean for it to happen like that. I was going to make it romantic—rose petals and candles and music—and I was going to be real slow and gentle. I'm so sorry." He rocked her back and forth slightly, her face in his chest.

"You don't have to be sorry," she murmured into his chest. "I wanted it. Hell, I started it. And it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be." This was a flat-out lie.

Jack knew it too. He chuckled and lifted her face to his, kissing her softly on the lips. "You're a hell of a woman, Katie Wayne," he told her. If she had any regrets, they dissipated at the tenderness in his eyes and in his voice. He stood up, still clutching her in his arms. "Come on, let's go take a shower."

In the tiny bathroom she sat on the toilet as he adjusted the temperature in the shower and gazed at him with frank curiosity. He caught her gaze and shot her his wonderful roguish grin. "Don't tell me you've never seen one of these before," he said.

"When I was at boarding school, one of the girls smuggled in some porno," she confessed, grinning herself now. "So yes, I've seen a few naked dudes." She ducked her head and added shyly, "You look a lot better than those guys, though." He did, too. Jack was slender, almost wiry, and while he was no one's idea of a bodybuilder he had definite muscles in his arms, legs, and flat stomach. And while Katie didn't think she'd ever be sexually evolved enough to find the male member beautiful, she had to admit that his wanker was quite pretty compared to the few others she'd seen. Watching him, she was surprised to feel the stirrings of desire yet again, sore as she was.

They got into the shower and stood under the warm spray. Jack put his arms around her and she leaned into him, her head against his chest. Suddenly his grip grew tighter. "Oh, shit, Katie," he gasped. "I didn't wear a rubber."

"Don't worry about it," Katie said lazily.

"But what if you get pregnant?"

"I'm not going to," she stated. "I went to the doctor two months ago and got on the Pill. I figured it would happen sooner or later, and I wanted to be prepared. I didn't think it would take this long, though." She grinned up at him. "Is that why you were holding out on me? You were afraid of getting me knocked up?"

"No, that's not why," he said, playfully smacking her butt. "I've been carrying a pack of Trojans around with me for the last two months—which I apparently won't need now. Anyway, the reason I've been 'holding out on you' as you put it, is that I love you and I wanted to make your first time just right…" He trailed off as he realized what he'd said.

Katie turned to face him. "Could you repeat that, please?"

He reddened. "You heard me, damn it."

"I want to hear it again."

"All right, I love you. I love you, Katie Wayne. I love your freckles and your smile and your cute little ass. I love your wild hair and the fact that you're clumsy as hell. I love that you can't cook worth a damn and blurt out whatever you're thinking and get drunk and sing to me. I love everything about you." He glowered at her. "There, are you satisfied?"

She laughed out loud. "For now."

"For now?" he repeated. 'What's that supposed to mean?"

"That means," she gave him her best seductive smile, "that as soon as we get out of here I want you to jump my bones again, and then I'll be satisfied. What do you make of that?"

He pulled her against him. "I can do better than that," he whispered in her ear as his hands began to explore her body again. "I'll jump your bones right here up against the side of this tub." And he did, and this time it was different. This time there was no pain, only a slight irritation that quickly turned to a delicious hot friction that seemed to spiral up and up and up, until it consumed her whole body. Katie shrieked as the climax tore through her. He shuddered, but managed to keep a hold of her.

"OK," Katie gasped once she could finally talk again. "I think I see what all the hype is about now."

"It takes a couple of times to get the hang of it," he told her as he began to soap up her body with his bare hands. "Did I ever tell you about my first time?"

Katie was struggling to stay upright—her solar plexus seemed to be dissolving. "Um, no," she said weakly. "I don't believe you did."

He told her the story even as his hands wandered all over her body doing all sorts of naughty and exciting things. "It was a total cliché. I was fifteen, she was seventeen and sort of a nympho—" he nibbled at her neck playfully, and she moaned—"who made a career of deflowering male virgins. One day she slipped me a note in the hall that said 'Meet me tonight at my place. My folks will be out.' So I did." He laughed. "It was a disaster. I ended up coming all over the place before I even got inside her."

"Sounds like a teen sex comedy," Katie murmured, shuddering as he ran his hands along her inner thighs.

"It does, doesn't it? Marcie was a good old girl, though. I was humiliated, but she just laughed. Said it happened all the time. She gave me another chance—" right then his hands found their way to the magic spot—"and I must say I acquitted myself rather well the second time around." She groaned as yet another orgasm rocked her.

"Well, part of me wants to hate this Marcie bitch for getting to you first," she managed finally, "but part of me wants to send her a thank-you note if that contributed to making you the stud you are today."

They laughed again. Looking back, Katie would always remember this night as one of laughter and tenderness. In years to come she would almost hate Jack Napier—and with good reason—but then her mind would flash back to this night, the night of her eighteenth birthday, when he had ushered her into womanhood so sweetly and caringly. Even as the pain and rage swirled through her heart, she could never bring herself to hate him completely.

They stayed in the shower until the hot water was gone. When they got out, Jack toweled her off as gently and lovingly as if he were polishing a diamond. "Stay with me tonight," he requested.

"You couldn't make me leave," she responded. Indeed, after what they had shared tonight she wanted to stay in his arms forever. If he had asked her to marry him that night she would have said 'yes' without hesitation.

He didn't, though. After they were dry they went to his room, where he found a T-shirt for her to wear. The events of the day had caught up with her, and all of a sudden she was so tired she could barely move. He tucked her into his bed and lay next to her, wrapping his arms around her. She laid her head on his chest, and the last thing she heard as she drifted off to sleep was her lover's heart beating.

--

Sleep didn't come so easily for Jack, though. He laid and stared at the ceiling, absentmindedly stroking the riot of strawberry-blonde curls that belonged to this beautiful, naïve, unbelievably wealthy young woman who loved him so completely.

His plan was coming along perfectly. Jack Napier was just as much of a fortune hunter as the men Katie had so avoided in her Heathrow years. He had grown up in poverty, and since his earliest memories the privation he had lived with had disgusted him. All his life he had vowed to get out of it, one way or the other. He had grabbed at the scholarship to Gotham U, though he had railed inwardly at the thought of being a starving college student, and the years of living lean that were sure to follow while he established a career. There had to be a better way—a faster way. He would find it in Gotham City.

His chance had come when he discovered the Wayne heiress would be enrolling at Gotham U. He had sniffed her out almost immediately—Darren worked part-time in the admissions office, and thought nothing of his good buddy Jack stopping by to visit him on the job and offering to man the phones for him while he took a smoke break—and he had been gratified to discover she was such a pretty thing. That would make things much more pleasant for him.

For two months he had waited, shadowing her around campus, figuring out her course schedule, deciding on the place and time to arrange their first meeting. Finally, when spring was in the air, he made his move. As she finished her final Tuesday class and strolled across the quad—which she always did on her way to the subway station after her last Tuesday class—he had maneuvered right into her path.

From then on, things had progressed almost as if they were predestined, with only the slightest occasional nudge from him. It had been—he grinned mirthlessly—why, it had been just like taking candy from a baby.

His grin faded. There had been one unexpected result, though, something he hadn't foreseen. During all his plotting and scheming to woo and win Katie Wayne, it had never once occurred to Jack that he would fall as madly in love with her as she had with him.

But it had happened, all right. He had suspected it for a while, and now he was sure. Waiting to have sex with her had been part of the original plan, but he had never intended to wait _this _long. It was with incredulity that he realized he had been holding off for exactly the reason he'd told her earlier—because he loved her and he wanted it to be perfect for her.

It changed things—and yet it didn't, really. Jack still planned to get his hands on a substantial chunk of the Wayne fortune. But he was going to go about it differently. Instead of knocking Katie up and eloping with her (which would have had to be rethought anyway since she'd gotten on the Pill), he would grit his teeth and live in squalor a while longer. He would be a junior this fall. When senior year rolled around he would propose to Katie the old-fashioned way, down on one knee and all. He knew faraway cousin Bruce and Alfred the Omnipresent would probably be less than thrilled, but he knew too that Katie would be so over the moon that she wouldn't listen to a word they said. And he would bring them around. He would tell them very seriously that he really loved Katie and wanted to do right by her, and above all wanted her to complete her education. He would mention his plans for law school. When help was offered—as of course it would be—he would accept with humble gratitude.

They would be married following his graduation. Of course it would be a huge, elaborate wedding, and of course Bruce Wayne would pay for the whole shebang. The bride's family usually paid anyway, he knew. After a wonderful, exotic honeymoon—perhaps Italy, since Katie always talked about going there—they would return to Gotham City and set up housekeeping. Maybe not at Wayne Manor, but somewhere a definite step above the shitholes he'd lived in all his life. He envisioned an elegant brownstone on one of the quiet, tree-lined streets in the nice part of Gotham. There they would settle down to their studies, without anything silly like jobs to worry about. Eventually the children would start to come…

He smiled again, but this time it was the sweet, open smile Katie knew and loved. _I'm gonna have it all, _he thought, _love _and _money_. It would suck to have to continue to live like this, but he had done it for twenty years. He could stand it a little longer. For Katie, he could stand it.

His future sighed in her sleep and stirred a little. He embraced her a little tighter and bent his head to press his lips against her forehead. "Love you, baby," he whispered.

**A/N: I told you things were gonna get darker! You didn't really think Jack friggin' Napier was as perfect as he seemed, now did you? I know the Joker as he appears in TDK is more concerned with anarchy than wealth, but you can tell now that handsome Jack was never Mr. Mental Health to begin with. As we journey on he'll get plenty more warped and his priorities will shift. Mad props to Wikipedia for providing the Coney Island info. Thanks to Siriuswriter for my one (mostly positive!) review, to Marie and Mifey for putting my twisted tale on their alerts, and to everyone else who's been reading. Once again, feedback is greatly appreciated! **


	4. Aw Honey, Our First Fight

**A/N: Sorry it took so long to update, but I had a serious case of writer's block (actually it was more like writer's black hole). Then TDK _finally _opened and I got inspired again (insert angel choirs and sunbursts here). Am I the only person on here who has a totally inappropriate crush on Heath's Joker? Anyways, thanks to everyone who's read, reviewed, and put my little tale on their alerts and/or favorites!**

CHAPTER 4

It was the first day of the fall semester, and already Katie couldn't wait for it to be over. She could tell she was going to have to get down to some serious ass-busting. Last semester had been a cakewalk—all she'd had was English, Intro to Psychology, Behavior and Experience, and Biology. She had loved the first three and sailed through them effortlessly, finishing with A's; she hadn't really cared for biology but still squeaked through with a B-minus. This semester, though, they were really putting it to her. Her first class of the day (at 8:30, which was cruel and unusual punishment in her opinion) was Algebra. Katie disliked mathematics in any way, shape or form, and hate was especially high in her heart for algebra. She knew even if she kept her nose to the grindstone the whole semester she would be lucky to escape with a C.

After algebra came Abnormal Psych, which she was at least looking forward to. But she could tell already it was going to be a lot more in-depth than her previous psych courses. Same deal with Contemporary Topics in Psychology, which was her next class. She thought it might be a tad easier than Abnormal Psych but couldn't be sure just yet. It figured that Jonathan Crane was in neither class—she could have really used him this time around. Western Art I would seem like a treat after those three, even though she had chosen it at random because she needed a humanities/fine arts elective.

_Oh, God, what am I doing to myself? _she thought. _I'm never going to have any time for fun ever again. I'll be lucky just to have time to take a piss. Now I understand why a lot of heiresses blow off higher education and just enjoy their money. _For a moment Katie considered what it would be like to spend her days doing whatever the hell she wanted—shopping, lunching with the other young socialites of Gotham, getting her hair done. It would be nice, except for the fact that she hated to shop and avoided it at all costs, felt the same way about most of Gotham's junior jet set, and having her hair done was sheer torture for her. About the only "rich" activities she enjoyed were manicures and pedicures. And even if one was wealthy there was no need for a mani/pedi every single day.

No, Katie concluded, she was better off doing something worthwhile. At least she could show up the "ladies who lunched" of Gotham by doing something productive with her time, if nothing else. They always turned up their noses at her, at her casual clothes and decidedly middle-class air. The least she could do in return was make them look as spoiled and lazy as they were. And she enjoyed school, really. Psychology fascinated her, and on the off chance that some calamity befell the Wayne billions she would be able to make a comfortable living.

Besides, today had just been the first day. They had no assignments yet, and classes had been abbreviated. She was headed to Jack's place to spend the rest of the day with him, hopefully doing what they liked best.

She and Jack had been together now for just over five months, and if things continued to go as well as they had been Katie expected a proposal sometime in the not-too-distant future. She had caught herself flipping through bridal magazines at the bookstore, thinking about the kind of dress, flowers, and cake she would want. She had also been humiliated when Alfred had presented her with a piece of paper she'd left in the library on which she had doodled "Katie Napier," "Katherine Wayne Napier," "Mr. and Mrs. Jack Andrew Napier," and "Jack + KatieTru Luv 4-Ever". Once or twice she had even thought about kids' names. She liked Michael for a boy, and of course their first daughter would be Lily.

Her friends in long-term relationships had warned her that once she started sleeping with Jack that was all he'd want to do. Happily, they were wrong. Finally having sex hadn't subtracted anything from their relationship. They still did the things they'd done before That Night (she always thought of it in capital letters). It was just that now they did this wonderful other thing as well. As often as they could. In as many different places and positions as they could. And truth be told, even if her friends _had _been right Katie wouldn't have minded.

Katie was so lost in her thoughts that she walked right into someone as she strolled across the Quad—for the second and last time, as it turned out. Luckily, this time she managed to stay upright and hold onto her belongings.

"Sorry, dude," she said absently, barely glancing at the guy she'd plowed into.

"That's quite all right," said a familiar voice. "How was your summer, Katie?"

She looked at the guy, then had to stop herself from doing a classic double take. "Jonathan!" she exclaimed.

She couldn't help thinking he was looking pretty good these days. His hair was a little longer, flopping over his forehead and into those astonishing blue eyes. He wasn't wearing a suit, either, but khakis and a polo—still a little fancy by Gotham U standards but a definite improvement. He had even ditched the briefcase, and was carrying a regular Jansport like everybody else. She couldn't imagine anyone calling him Professor now—or Scarecrow, for that matter.

"My summer was great," she said. "A lot of fun. How about yours?" She tried not to let her amazement at his semi-transformation show too obviously.

"It was fine," he said. "I took some courses, and I'm doubling up on my load this year. I'll be graduating next year now."

"Awesome," she replied. "I'm still a freshman, I'm afraid."

He smiled. "A freshman who made the Dean's List last semester, as I recall," he replied. "And you finished high school early, so you'll graduate early in any case."

_Well, I'll be damned, _she thought. He was actually flirting with her, in his way. And she was a little bit charmed.

"Maybe," she said modestly. "I think this year is really going to kick my ass, though."

"You'll do fine," he assured her. "If you need any help, though, just let me know."

"I will," she promised, thinking with surprise that she actually might just do that.

"Would you like to get some lunch or something?" Jonathan asked.

_Shit. _"I'd like to," she responded carefully, "but I'm supposed to be meeting my boyfriend in a few minutes." She hated to reject him after the first comfortable conversation they'd ever had, but she _was _with Jack now.

His smile faded. "I see," he said, the "Professor" tone creeping back into his voice.

Katie began to babble, trying to make him see that she was telling the truth, that she really wasn't blowing him off again. "I'm dating Jack Napier. He's a junior, a poli sci major. Maybe you know him?"

"I know of him," Jonathan said coolly. "He's a scholarship student, right?" His undeniably sensuous mouth curled into a sneer at the word "scholarship".

Katie stiffened. "He is," she said shortly. "Well, I need to run."

He made no move to let her by. "What does your cousin think about you dating someone…well…not of your class?" he asked in a musing tone.

Katie saw red. She had to clench her hands into fists to keep from slapping that sneer right off his face. "He says," she replied sweetly, "that he'd much rather see me with a self-made man than a spoiled, sissy rich boy." Bruce had never said anything of the kind, of course, but she was pretty sure he _would _feel that way. "And _I'd _much rather be with someone who worked hard and pulled himself up by the bootstraps than someone born with a silver spoon shoved up his ass."

He blanched at that. She felt a small, victorious thrill shoot through her. "I really must be going," she said with as much haughtiness as she could muster. This time he moved aside and let her pass. As she walked away, Katie's inner bitch reared her ugly head and caused her to say over her shoulder, "See you around, Scarecrow."

_What a bastard!_ she raged silently as she walked on. _I guess that old saying is true: "A leopard can't change its spots". He may not actually look like a stuffy, snotty prick anymore, but it's right there beneath the surface. Well, fuck you, Jonathan Crane. I meant every word I said. I'd take Jack over you any day of the week._

Thinking of Jack lifted her spirits. She began to walk faster, and by the time she reached his apartment she was almost running.

He had left the door unlocked for her. "Looocy, I'm home," she bellowed in a purposely bad Spanish accent as she let herself in.

He was right there waiting for her. Before she could say another word she was in his arms, his lips pressed hungrily to hers. She moaned into his mouth as his hands slid through her hair, down her back, beneath her T-shirt and under her bra. She ground herself against the telltale bulge in his jeans.

When he finally stopped kissing her she was weak in the knees and breathless. "Wow," she managed, "bet Ricky Ricardo never got a greeting like _that_."

He let out a short bark of a laugh. "Bet Lucy and Ricky never fucked on the kitchen table, either," he said as he slid his hands under her bottom and lifted her effortlessly to his own rickety kitchen table.

She was already soaking wet as he pulled her shorts off. "Baba-loo," was the last thing she said before his mouth was over hers again.

--

Much, much later she told him about her encounter with Scarecrow. She figured he would laugh over it, as they laughed over almost everything; she hadn't expected him to be upset.

But he was. "That arrogant little shithead," he fumed. "I'd like to fold his skinny little ass in half and stuff him in a trashcan." He glared at Katie. "And as for you—I don't need you to defend me."

Katie's mouth dropped open. "Excuse me?" she said indignantly. They had been snuggling on his bed. Now she pushed herself away and sat up. "Why shouldn't I have defended you? What was I supposed to do, stand there and let him talk shit about you? Should I have smiled and agreed with him?"

He sat up too. "I'm sure everyone else does," he snapped. "I'll bet everyone else thinks you're just slumming with me—getting in a little rough trade before you settle down and marry rich like you're supposed to."

Katie's temper was rising dangerously. She rose and started searching for her clothes. "It sounds like that's what _you _think," she said, her voice deceptively calm. "Well, Jack, have you ever considered that it might be the other way around? Don't you think maybe everyone thinks you're just with me for my money? A gigolo, so to speak?"

He leaped off the bed and grabbed her shoulders in his hands. "Who said that?" he snarled, shaking her hard. "Who the fuck said that about me? You tell me right now, Katie!" She had never seen him this angry. He was literally shaking with rage. She was so shocked she could only stare at him blankly.

"_Tell me who said that, goddamn it!" _he shouted in her face. He shoved her so hard she fell backward, barely managing to grab onto the bedpost and steady herself.

"_No one!" _she shrieked back, her eyes filling with angry tears. _"No one's ever said a word about us—but I know they've thought it!" _The tears spilled over, making her even madder, but hurt was close behind the fury. _"Why the fuck else would someone like you bother with someone like me? If you were the rich one and I was poor, you never would have looked at me twice!"_

He looked stricken. "That's not true," he said quietly, his anger vanishing as quickly as it had appeared. "The first time I saw you I thought you were the cutest thing I'd ever seen. And I still do."

She couldn't seem to stop crying. He crossed the room in one stride and grabbed her again. She flinched, but this time he was grabbing her to hug her. "I didn't even know who you were that first time, remember?" he crooned in her ear. She nodded, her face pressed into his chest. "I didn't figure it out for a while. And by that time I was already a goner. I'd have loved you even if you turned out to be an escapee from Arkham." She laughed unwillingly through the tears. "I love you, Katie, _you. _I don't care about the money.

"And I'm sorry I was such an asshole," he added. "You were very sweet to defend me, and you certainly put that jackass Crane in his place." She giggled again. "I don't know what's wrong with me lately. I just snap over the stupidest shit sometimes." He paused for a long moment. When he spoke again, his voice was rough with tears.

"I can't believe I…got physical with you," he said shakily. "I always swore I'd never do that to a woman, especially after Lily…and then I turned around and did it to the one I love. I'm so sorry, baby. Jesus, sometimes I feel like I'm losing my mind!"

He began to sob. Now it was Katie's turn to hold him, to stroke his hair, to whisper over and over, "Shhh…it's all right," as he cried in her arms.

"Don't leave me," he wept. "Please don't leave me. I'm so sorry."

"I know," she soothed. "I'm not leaving you. I'll never leave you."

"I need you," he continued. "I need you to help me through this."

"I'm here," she told him, holding him as tightly as she could. "I'm here. Whatever's wrong, we'll deal with it together. Honey, please try to calm down. Everything's going to be fine."

"…Never happen again…"

Finally she got him to lie down with her again on the bed, and eventually his tears gave way to the deep, even breathing of sleep. It never occurred to Katie to leave. She knew something was wrong with Jack. And she would never abandon him when he needed her most. She remembered their first date. He had helped her through her pain then. Now it was her turn to help him through his.

--

They put it behind them. Jack very convincingly explained his meltdown: He was exhausted. He'd been working double shifts at the campus bookstore, and even with that he was barely getting by. He, too, was facing some challenging classes this semester, and he had to keep his GPA up to keep his scholarship. With all these stressors on him, he had just blown his fuse. He had to unload on someone, and as it happened Katie was the only one around. He was all right now, though. He was looking around for better-paying jobs. He'd do whatever it took to keep his grades up, even hire a tutor if it came to that. No, he wouldn't take any money from Katie. Yes, he would get help if he started feeling that stressed out again.

So they moved forward. But things weren't quite the same as they had been before. Katie couldn't put her finger on it, but something in their relationship had shifted. She had seen a side of Jack she had never known existed. There had been murder in those dark brown eyes she knew as well as her own. For one brief instant, she had been absolutely sure he was going to do something terrible to her—at the very least, hit her.

Since then she had caught herself…not cowering…not exactly tiptoeing around him…but being very _careful _around him. Yes, that was it. She was being _careful. _Before she had always said anything and everything that was on her mind; now she found herself biting her tongue, refraining from telling him anything that might possibly get him riled. Jack was being his usual sweet self again, but…

As time went by, though, she gradually began to relax. By the time the holidays rolled around things really were back to normal between them—at least, that's what they both told themselves. But sometimes Katie couldn't help but feel that a small crack had appeared in the shiny, perfect veneer of their relationship.

Small cracks have a way of spiderwebbing.


	5. The Ball

CHAPTER 5

_December 31__st__._

"I really can't stay," Katie sang softly as she pulled on her stockings. "I've got to go 'way…This evening has been…so very nice…" She hooked the stockings to her garter belt. There. Her foundation garments were in place. Now she had only to get into her gown. This was a two-person job. "Lex?" she called. "I need some help here."

Lexi Fox, stunning in emerald-green satin, came in. "You know, Katie," she remarked as she slid the dress off its hanger and carried it to where Katie stood in front of the three-way mirror, "if I didn't know better I'd say you were excited about tonight."

Katie made a face. "Oh hells no," she said as she stepped into the dress. "I wouldn't even be doing this if Bruce had been able to come home. But he's held up in Singapore on some kind of business, and Alfred insisted. 'A Wayne has to host the Wayne ball,' he said. I guess he's right. But I'd really rather be having a kegger at Jack's."

It was half-true. Try as she might to hide it, Katie couldn't help but be a teensy bit excited about this, her first big social occasion at Wayne Manor. Over the years she had attended a few functions during school breaks, dinner parties mostly, a small cocktail party or two. But the Wayne Ball was big-time. The Wayne family had hosted an ultra formal New Year's Eve ball every year since anyone could remember, and it was considered _the _annual social event in Gotham City. Katie had always been deemed too young to attend before. Now she was finally old enough, and she was _hosting _the damn thing. It was enough to turn any girl's head. She had never made her official debut—she hadn't wanted to fool with all the debutante bullshit, and Bruce and Alfred hadn't pressed her—but tonight would be her debut, in a way. Although she'd die before she admitted it, she was almost as excited as she was nervous.

"I want to thank you again, Lexi," she told her friend. "If you hadn't agreed to be my co-hostess, I would have been screwed. I've never even _been _to a party this big, let alone hosted one."

"Nah," Lexi disagreed. "You'd have been fine. This ball has happened every year since the Flood. It probably practically runs itself by now. I don't mind helping you out, though. But I still think you'd have been OK. You're a Wayne; this kind of thing is in your blood. You'll probably get down there and know exactly what to do." She finished buttoning Katie's gown and stepped back. "And you're definitely gonna look the part no matter what."

Katie stared at the mirror, transfixed. _This can't be me_, she thought. She knew she was a cute girl, but right now she looked anything but cute. She looked…elegant. Beautiful. Formidable. Almost exactly like the portrait of her grandmother in the library.

She had had her hair professionally done. The wild reddish-blonde mop had been transformed into an elegant upsweep, softened by a few loose tendrils around her face. The stylist had also done her makeup, more dramatic than Katie usually liked but she could see now that it was exactly right for this night. She had chosen the dress herself, a midnight-blue velvet that closely fitted her waist and hips, then flared out slightly at mid-thigh. It had long fitted sleeves and a sweetheart neckline that showed just enough cleavage to be a little provocative, and thus was _very _provocative.

"Wow," was all she could say.

"You're going to scald some eyeballs," Lexi told her. "And now for the _piece de resistance_." She picked up the black jewelry case on the dressing table and lifted out an exquisite diamond-and-sapphire choker. "Your grandmother's necklace. This baby is the icing on the cake." She fastened it around her friend's neck. As she did, the huge pear-shaped diamond on her left hand caught the light and sparkled. Thad, her long-time boyfriend, had popped the question over Christmas, and they were planning a fall wedding. She had already asked Katie to be her maid of honor, and she had accepted.

"Where are your earrings?" Lexi asked.

Katie pointed at a smaller case on the dressing table. "Right there."

Lexi opened the case and whistled. "So _this _was Jack's Christmas present," she remarked. "You better hold onto him, girl." When Katie said Jack had given her diamond earrings for Christmas, Lexi had envisioned tiny studs. She knew Jack didn't have a lot of money. But these were at least half a carat, and Lexi's trained eye could tell the diamonds were of excellent quality. "These must have cost him a fortune."

"He said he saved his money all fall," Katie replied as she put the earrings in. "And Alex and Darren forgave him this month's share of the rent. He said that was their Christmas present."

"Well, they're gorgeous," Lexi said. "They look great with the necklace—not too much, but not too little. So, I take it things are going well for you two?"

Katie smiled. "Oh yes," she said. And they were. After the incident at the beginning of school, things were back on track between them. Jack had pulled himself together. He _had_ gotten a better-paying job—Alex had gotten him on at Guido's, and with his looks and charm Jack raked in the tips. The hours were better, too, and he had had plenty of time to study. His grades had been just high enough to keep his scholarship. They hadn't gotten to spend as much time together as they had previously, bur Katie understood. She didn't want him to push himself too hard. She had seen what happened when he did.

Christmas had been wonderful. Without the worry of school looming over him, Jack was even more his old self again. They had spent every moment he wasn't working together. The first day of Christmas break they had driven out to the country with a huge thermos of hot chocolate and spent the day playing in the snow like little kids—sledding, having snowball fights, and building a snowman Katie privately dubbed "Parson Brown". They had laughed and cut up just like they used to, and it thrilled Katie to see Jack so happy and relaxed.

He had planned to go home Christmas Eve and stay until the day after, but at the last minute his mom had called to say she had to work the holiday and not to bother. So he had spent Christmas at Wayne Manor. It had been a quiet, peaceful day. They had slept late and opened presents in the early afternoon—they had each had a pile of gifts that had mysteriously appeared in the night, bearing tags that said "From Santa". Santa's handwriting bore a striking resemblance to Alfred's. Alfred himself had presented her with Grandmother Katherine's necklace. He said Bruce had instructed him to give it to her; that as the only Wayne granddaughter it was hers by right, and he wanted her to have it this year, her first as an adult.

They had eaten the traditional Wayne Christmas dinner of roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, and Katie had insisted that Alfred join them at the table. After demurring a bit, he had. They had all stuffed themselves and drunk copious amounts of champagne, and Katie had been able to stop herself from becoming more than pleasantly tipsy. They had ended the day in the library before a crackling fire, watching _It's a Wonderful Life _("the black-and-white version, as God intended," Katie had decreed). She had cried and Jack had laughed at her, but affectionately. Alfred bade them good night and retreated to his quarters, and they had capped off the holiday by making love on the rug in front of the fireplace.

"I love you, Jack," she had told him afterward as they lay in each other's arms, the fire flickering softly in front of them.

"I love you, too," he had said, tracing her profile with his fingertip.

"This has been the best Christmas ever," she said.

He had laughed and kissed her tenderly. "It has been," he said. "But someday it'll be even better."

"How so?" Katie asked sleepily, snuggling into his side.

"Someday we'll have Christmas in our own house, and there'll be little monsters climbing the tree and opening each other's presents and deciding they like the boxes better than the gifts that came in them, and it'll be absolute chaos, and we'll love every minute of it," he murmured in her ear, "and _that _will be the best Christmas ever."

"Jack," Katie gasped, sitting up in surprise. "Do you mean…"

He sat up and embraced her. "I want to spend my life with you," he whispered. "I'm gonna have to wait a little longer to officially ask you, but…"

"Well, I'm officially saying yes right now," she whispered back, just as his mouth found hers.

"Katie! Earth to Katie!" Lexi was snapping her fingers in front of Katie's face.

Katie abruptly returned from her stroll down memory lane. "What?" she asked. "Sorry. I went away there for a minute."

"I can see that," Lexi said dryly. "Must have been somewhere good, too, from the looks of you." Katie looked in the mirror. Her cheeks were flushed, and her eyes sparkled like the sapphires in her necklace. That wasn't all that was going on, either. She went even redder when she realized she was wet underneath her dress. _Thank God women don't have to try to cover up hard-ons_, she thought.

"It's time to go downstairs," Lexi said. "The guests will start arriving soon, and we need to do a walk-through and make sure everything is in place."

"Right," Katie said crisply, trying to cover up her embarrassment. "On we go, then."

"I'm assuming Jack will be here tonight?" Lexi asked as they left Katie's room and started for the stairs.

"Yep," Katie confirmed. "He didn't want to come, but I talked him into it. Alex and Darren are coming, too, for moral support."

Lexi grinned wickedly. "Maybe it's a good thing you asked me to help you hostess," she said as they descended the staircase. "I can keep an eye on you and keep you from sneaking off to the coatroom and…" She trailed off suggestively.

Katie brightened. "Hey, I hadn't thought of that."

--

It was only 9:30, but the party was already an unqualified success. Lexi had been right. As soon as Alfred ushered in the first guests, all Katie's training from Heathrow had come flooding back…or perhaps the spirits of Katherine and Martha Wayne were guiding her. It helped that she had met the couple before, at one of Bruce's dinner parties. "Mr. and Mrs. Farnsworth," she murmured. "It's a pleasure to see you. I'm so happy you could come."

From then on it had been smooth sailing. Lexi had stayed by her side until all the guests arrived, providing introductions to the ones she didn't know, which was most of them. To all of them she had smiled and repeated variations of her earlier greeting. Everyone seemed charmed by her. Several of the older guests remarked on her resemblance to her grandmother, which boosted her confidence even higher.

"You're doing great," Lexi whispered to her after she had greeted the last guest. "Now just go mingle. I'll be nearby if you need me for anything."

So far she hadn't. She had moved about the party effortlessly, seeing that everyone had what they wanted as far as food and drink, making sure that no one felt like a wallflower. As the evening progressed she could see a look of pride in Lexi's eyes, in Alfred's, and most especially in Jack's.

Katie was so proud of Jack she could bust. In his tuxedo he looked like a _GQ _model, and he behaved as though he'd been attending parties like these all his life. She introduced him to many of the guests, and while some were a bit cool at first no one out-and-out snubbed him—and eventually they were all won over by his charm and obvious adoration of her. "He may have come from nothing," she overheard someone say, "but you can bet that one's going to be somebody."

She glanced at Jack nervously, but he just smiled down at her. "Well, it's true," he shrugged. "On both counts." She relaxed.

He materialized at her side now, offering her a flute of champagne. "Here," he said. "You deserve it."

"Are you sure…" she muttered, looking around at the guests. "Do you really think I should…"

"I really do," he said, handing her the glass. "I think you can handle it; you're certainly handling everything else. Just stick to ginger ale after this."

"Katie," a voice said behind her, "you're doing an absolutely magnificent job."

She turned, her practiced social smile melting into one of real pleasure. "Mr. Fox!" she exclaimed, hugging the man she had known since childhood.

Lucius Fox was a distinguished-looking yet grandfatherly man in his sixties. He had worked for Wayne Enterprises since he was a young man fresh out of college, in the days of Thomas Wayne, Senior, and he had been one of Thomas, Junior's closest friends. Katie had known him since her childhood playdates with Lexi, and she had always loved him.

"I remember your grandmother at these parties," he told her, "and it's almost as if she's here tonight. You look exactly like her, and you move and sound like her, too. It's uncanny."

"Thank you," Katie said. "Or thank your daughter, rather. I wouldn't have known what to do if she hadn't agreed to help me out."

Lucius smiled. "I think you would have done just fine," he said, "but Alexandra has never said no to anything involving a party." He turned to Jack. "And this must be your young man?"

"Mr. Fox, this is Jack Napier," Katie said, just the way she'd been taught at Heathrow. "He's a junior at Gotham U. Jack, this is Lucius Fox, Lexi's father and a dear family friend."

"Pleased to meet you," Jack said as they shook hands.

"Likewise," Lucius responded. "Alexandra's told me about you. You're a scholarship student, I believe?"

She felt Jack tense beside her. "Yes," he said shortly.

"So was I," Lucius said easily. "Class of '62, engineering. What's your major?"

Jack relaxed, and his eyes warmed. "I started out in political science," he told the older man, "but I switched to pre-law this year."

"You'll be going on to law school, of course."

"I hope to."

"Good. Perhaps you'll come to work for Wayne Enterprises afterward. We can always use lawyers."

Jack smiled. "Maybe I will."

"Thomas Wayne always admired men who made their own way in the world," Lucius said, "'Men of substance' he called them. He said he'd rather have one man of substance working for him than ten men born to a life of privilege. I think he'd be pleased to know his granddaughter felt the same way." He winked. "Don't let the bastards get you down."

"I like him," Jack said as Lucius walked away to speak to another guest.

"I had a feeling you would," Katie replied.

--

The night wore on. The dancing began, and Katie took a turn with most of the male guests. Her feet ached and her face was starting to hurt from smiling, but it was her duty.

To her credit, she did her duty well enough that all the men believed she would rather be dancing with them than anywhere else in the world.

"Katie." She looked up to see Jonathan Crane.

"Jonathan," she said politely. She had met his parents earlier in the evening but hadn't seen him; he must have slipped in later. She hadn't seen him since their encounter on the Quad earlier in the fall. He stood before her, fidgeting nervously.

"Relax, Jonathan," she said under her breath. "I'm not gonna blast you in front of all these people." She added, "As much as I'd like to."

He swallowed. "About that," he said. "I…wanted to apologize for that. I was way out of line."

"Yes, you were," Katie agreed. "But since you're a guest in my house, I'll have to forgive you."

"Thank you," he said. "Would…would you like to dance?"

Katie summoned all her acting ability and gave him a gracious smile, more for the benefit of any onlookers than for him. "Of course."

"You look lovely tonight, Katie," he told her as they moved around the floor. The band was playing "Strangers in the Night" so they were slow-dancing, and he was holding her just a little too close for comfort. She hoped no one else noticed, especially Jack, but saw him dancing with a Gotham debutante so figured he wouldn't.

"Thank you," she said simply. She hated to admit that, while she wasn't exactly enjoying herself, she wasn't exactly miserable either. He was a good dancer for someone so gangly and awkward, and his arms felt undeniably good around her. _No, _she scolded herself. _Crane's an asshole, remember? You're just being nice to him because you have to be. What is it with this weird attraction to Scarecrow, anyway? You're as good as engaged to Jack, remember? It's him you love, him you want to be dancing with right now. Never mind that Crane's got the most eerily beautiful eyes you've ever seen. Never mind that he's got those full, sensuous lips made for kissing. _

She winced. The champagne must be getting to her. "Are you all right?" Jonathan asked.

She quickly pasted her smile back on. "I'm fine," she assured him. "So, uh…how's school?"

"School is fine," he said dismissively. "How have you been doing? How was your Christmas?"

She smiled a real smile. "Things have been great," she said. "Christmas was wonderful."

"Did Jack…propose?" he asked.

_None of your damn business. And do you see a ring on my finger?_ "Not yet," she said brightly, "at least officially, anyway. He gave me these, though." She turned her head to display the earrings.

"Pretty," he said, "and expensive. He must have had to really save for those."

She looked sharply at him, but there was no mocking in his tone or face. Instead he looked…sad?

"He must really love you," he said wistfully, "to spend money he hasn't got on you. He must love you very much." His translucent blue eyes gazed at her with naked longing.

Katie swallowed. "Jonathan…"

"Yes, I do," said Jack from behind her. She jumped and whirled to face him. Had he overheard the whole exchange? Had he seen how closely Jonathan was holding her…and had he seen that she hadn't minded it at all?

Apparently not. He smiled lovingly at her, then flicked a dismissing gaze over Jonathan. "May I cut in?" he asked, already moving to take her in his arms.

"Of course," Jonathan said, moving aside quickly. "Happy New Year, Katie."

"Happy New Year, Jonathan," she said quietly before Jack swept her away.

"Christ, what a weirdo," he whispered in her ear. "Sorry I couldn't rescue you from him earlier."

"Me too," she whispered back.

"I had to pry that little Paris Hilton wannabe off me," he continued. Katie giggled as she relaxed into his arms. _Yeah, _she thought. _This is definitely the guy for me. That thing with Jonathan doesn't mean anything. It's natural to be attracted to other guys sometimes, as long as I don't have the urge to act on it. Which I don't._

She smiled up at her boyfriend. "You're having a good time, aren't you?"

'Yeah," Jack confessed. "I didn't expect to…but I am." He glanced around. "Look. Everybody's looking at us."

She felt a chill at his words before she looked around. A lot of people were indeed gazing at them, but she didn't see any censure in their faces. Rather, she saw a mix of admiration and envy, on the men's faces as well as the women's.

"I think they're admiring us," she told him.

"I think they're admiring _you_," he replied as he dipped her low. Katie laughed with surprise as well as relief. He wasn't paranoid, after all. He was just fine. She needed to start cutting him some slack. He had hit a rough patch in the fall, but he had gotten through it. _They _had gotten through it. Everything was good now, and would be from now on.

She didn't know how wrong she was.

--

It was nearly 3 A.M. The party was winding down fast. Only a few diehards were left.

"God," Lexi said, yawning and stretching, "I'm ready to go home and sleep for a week."

Katie agreed wholeheartedly. She had enjoyed herself far more than she expected, but she was bone-tired. Being a hostess was more exhausting than it looked.

"Meet me on Tuesday to go wedding dress shopping?" Lexi asked.

"You bet," Katie said over a yawn. "Got to make sure you don't stick me in a hideous bridesmaid's dress just to make yourself look better."

"I wouldn't do that to you," Lexi protested, laughing. "Besides, even if I did I have the feeling you'll have the chance to get back at me pretty soon."

Their conversation was interrupted by an ear-splitting scream. "What the hell…" Lexi started.

The piercing screech became words. "I'VE BEEN ROBBED!"

The screamer stood at the foot of the staircase. It was the little Paris Hilton wannabe Jack had danced with earlier, only now she looked more like Paris Hilton after a bender. She was disheveled, her mascara streaking down her face, and the thick ruby choker she'd been wearing earlier was conspicuously absent.

_Oh shit_, Katie thought even as she ran to comfort the sobbing girl. _Guess I won't be going to bed anytime soon. _

And she didn't. By the time the police arrived, questioned the girl and everyone else in the house, took the girl home, and finally cleared the remaining guests to leave, it was dawn. Katie climbed the stairs slowly, exhausted and shaken.

The girl—Destiny Parrish, of the Parrish textile family—had indeed been robbed. Katie had sat with her in the library while the police questioned her. Apparently she had been coming out of the third-floor bathroom when a shadowy figure grabbed her and forced her into a guest room. He had threatened her at knifepoint, demanding the choker. Then Destiny's story got really creepy.

"I gave him the choker," she had sobbed, "and I hoped he would leave. But he just grabbed me again and put the knife against my neck." She shuddered. Katie, suppressing a shudder of her own, stroked her hand comfortingly and urged her to drink a little more of the hot coffee laced with brandy Alfred had brought her.

"And what happened then, Miss Parrish?" the officer questioned gently. His badge identified him as James Gordon. Katie was glad he was the one in charge of questioning. He was a lot more patient than the other officers had been, and he had kind eyes.

"Well," Destiny continued, "I was scared he was going to, you know, rape me, so I started begging him to leave me alone. I didn't scream because he'd already told me he'd cut my heart out if I made any noise." Katie flinched at that. "He just laughed and said, 'Why so serious?' Then he t-took the knife from my n-neck and…" she began to sob again.

"What did he do then?" Officer Gordon asked softly.

Tears flowed down the Destiny's cheeks. "He put it up to the corner of my m-mouth. He said…he said…" she gasped for air as she relived the horrible scene. Katie instinctively put her arms around the girl and glared at Officer Gordon. _Do you have to do this now? _she asked him with her eyes. _Can't you wait until she calms down a little?_

"I have to do this," he said. Katie jumped. Had he read her mind? "I know you've been through a terrible experience, Miss Parrish, but it's very important we get all the information you can give us so we can find the man who did this to you." He directed his next words to Katie. "The best time to question a victim is immediately after the crime. If even a little time passes their recall becomes flawed."

"I understand," she murmured. She did. She had read that very thing in her psychology textbooks. But somehow it was hard to implement in a real-life situation like this.

"Go on when you can, sweetie," she urged the girl.

Destiny took another gulp of coffee and continued. "He said…'Let's put a smile on that face.' And I guess I must have fainted, because I woke up on the floor and he was gone."

"And you're absolutely sure he didn't…take advantage of you?" Gordon asked delicately.

She nodded. "I'm sure. My clothes and everything weren't…he hadn't messed with them."

"And that's when you ran downstairs," Gordon concluded.

"That's when I ran downstairs, yes."

"And you're sure you can't describe him for me?"

"No," Destiny said, clearly aggravated. "I told you, he was wearing a ski mask, and he had on a red jacket with the hood pulled over his face. I didn't get a look at him at all."

"Was he tall? Short? What was his body type?"

"He was pretty tall, about six feet I guess. And he was thin, almost skinny…but he was strong." She shuddered again. "His arms were like iron bands around me."

"Is there anything else?" Gordon asked. "Anything at all about him you can tell me?"

"Well…he smelled nice."

Gordon's pen froze in midair. "I beg your pardon?"

"He smelled nice," Destiny repeated. "I would have expected him to smell like B.O. or something, but he smelled really good. Like cologne. I can't remember what kind, but it's really popular. A lot of guys wear it."

"Was it Eternity?" Katie surprised herself by asking.

"That's it!" Destiny said excitedly. "Eternity! How did you know?"

"I just guessed," Katie said slowly. "You're right; a lot of guys wear it." Her own boyfriend, for one. Jonathan Crane for another.

As she finally headed to her bedroom, Katie reflected on Destiny's story. _Tall…skinny but strong…wearing Eternity. Well, that describes half the guys in this city. Not to mention half the guys at this party. Hell, that even describes my semi-fiancé and my weird, inappropriate crush. _

She hoped they caught the guy, whoever he was. The fucker had ruined her party. And she bet that poor little Paris imitator was going to have nightmares for a long, long time. Who had been in Wayne Manor tonight who would do such a thing?

As she reached her bedroom door she heard snoring from within, and broke into a tired smile. Jack. After the police questioned him, she had insisted he go on to bed. Suddenly she couldn't wait to be there with him.

In her room, she quickly shed her dress and underpinnings, pulled her hair down, and climbed into bed, makeup and all. Jack rolled over and put an arm around her, but didn't wake. She snuggled into him, the soft sheets and the warmth of his body instantly making her drowsy. Her last thought as she drifted off was _Hope tonight doesn't set the tone for the entire year._

It didn't. Katie Wayne's year was going to get much, much worse.

**A/N: Thank you for all the kind reviews! You know, I hadn't planned on continuing this story--I got stuck at the end of Chapter 3 and couldn't figure out how to go on--but then The Dark Knight _finally _came out and voila! Inspiration restored! (Along with buckets of fresh grief over darling Heath, but that's another story.) And the reviews are only urging me on. I'm glad everyone seems to enjoy this story as much as I'm enjoying writing it! Once again, thank you all, you're great! **


	6. All Hell's Breakin' Loose

**A/N: This was an extremely difficult chapter to write. There's a lot of me in it. In the great OC tradition, Katie is based upon myself (except I'm a brunette and was raised in a strictly middle-class home, and thankfully both my parents are still living). This chapter is based on an episode in a past relationship. The real episode wasn't quite as bad as the one in this chapter, but it was quite frightening and scarring nonetheless. I'm confident that Katie's thoughts and reactions are believable, because they're the same ones I had myself. This chapter is darker by far than the others, so don't say I didn't warn you.**

CHAPTER 6

_I hate Gotham in the winter, _Katie thought for the millionth time as she trudged along the slushy gray streets toward Jack's apartment. It was never really a nice city even in the spring and summer; in the dead of winter it was a thousand times worse. It was always bitterly cold, and the sun never seemed to shine, making everything even more gray and dismal than it was normally.

There was a sudden freezing gust of wind. She shivered and pulled her trench coat tighter, wishing she had driven. But the crime rate in Gotham seemed to be increasing daily, and a recent rash of carjackings had convinced her to park the Merc in the Wayne Manor garage for the time being. She hadn't driven it since before New Year's. The way the city was right now, even Jack was reluctant to take out his shitty Trans Am. Brand new luxury cars or rustbuckets, every vehicle in Gotham was fair game for the merry band of carjackers.

Alfred had begged her to take a cab to Jack's; had tried to call one for her, in fact. But she had refused. She wanted to walk. During her life she had found that long walks were good for sorting things out, and she had a lot on her mind to sort through these days. Now, though, she realized she could have just as well mulled things over in the back of a nice, warm taxi. In the great taxi tradition, though, now that she wanted one there was none to be found. Oh well. It wasn't much farther.

Katie was troubled, and she couldn't quite figure out why. Everything seemed to be fine, but she couldn't shake the feeling that things were not as they seemed.

Her body troubled her. Lately she had been plagued with terrible cramps and heavy bleeding, during her periods and sometimes between them. She had headaches a lot, and she always seemed to be tired. Lexi had been nagging her to go back to the doctor, and Katie had finally broken down and made an appointment. She thought Lexi's theory, that her birth control pills were the culprit, was probably correct. She hoped they could prescribe another kind for her, because she didn't want to have to deal with condoms. She doubted Jack would want to, either.

There had been a time, as recently as a month ago, that Katie would have gladly foregone both pills and rubbers and consequences be damned. She and Jack were in love, after all, and planning to get married. If she got knocked up, why, they would just wed a little sooner than planned. But the way things were now—the way _she _was now—she knew a pregnancy was the last thing they needed.

Jack worried her, too. On the surface he seemed fine. There had been no repeat of last fall's meltdown. But little red flags were cropping up in their relationship. For instance, his hours at Guido's seemed to be getting shorter and shorter…yet he always had a wad of cash on him. Tips, he said, and maybe some of it was. But Katie knew there had to be more to it. No one made _that _much in tips. And no one who frequented Guido's tipped in twenties, fifties, or hundreds.

How was he making so much money? Was he dealing? Was he gambling? Was he working for the Mob? Gotham had always been a family city—she smirked a little at the pun—and right now they were more visible than ever. Had Jack gotten himself involved with them? If he had, what would they do? What would _she _do? Could she pay them off? She doubted it; she had watched enough movies to know that the Family preferred regular lifetime payments, not one-time lump settlements. Could she do that? Did she want to?

A year ago, she reflected, she had never imagined she'd be worrying about things like this. Her biggest worries then had been learning her way around Gotham U, her classes, and trying to ward off Jonathan Crane while being nice enough that he wouldn't come after her if he ever did snap and go on a rampage. Those things now seemed trivial, laughable even. If Katie had learned anything in the past year, it was that the ones who seemed dangerous often weren't the ones to worry about. It was the ones you loved and trusted you had to watch out for.

She still loved Jack, desperately. But she wasn't sure she trusted him anymore, and she was beginning to be just a little bit afraid of him. Ever since New Year's he had grown more and more edgy and short-tempered. It hadn't spilled over on her, yet, but it had on several other people. A week earlier he and Darren had gotten into a fight over who left the milk out, and it had escalated into an old-fashioned brawl. By the time Alex managed to pull them apart, Darren had a black eye and a bloody nose, and Jack had a split lip. She hadn't been there to see it, but she had heard about it from Alex. He was as concerned about Jack as she. Darren had since packed up and moved into one of the dorms. Alex had freaked, wondering how they would make the rent with him gone, but Jack had been unconcerned. "I'll take care of it," he'd said.

In addition to his anger and moodiness, she knew he wasn't eating or sleeping well. It was starting to tell on him physically; he was thinner than ever, and his eyes always had dark circles under them. He was smoking like a fiend, too. He had always smoked socially, but now it was a constant thing. He was plowing through two packs of unfiltered Camels a day. Before he had stuck to Marlboro Lights, her own brand of choice on the rare occasions she smoked. When she asked him, carefully of course, what was up with the increase in nicotine, he had said brusquely, "Look, baby, I'm under a lot of pressure right now. I'm doing my best to deal with it. So just don't push it, OK?" She hadn't pushed it.

Alex was convinced he was into drugs, doing them or selling them or both. Katie wasn't so sure. She thought it might be something even worse. Passages from her Abnormal Psych textbook—specifically from the chapter on schizophrenia—kept running through her mind. Especially one: _It is not uncommon for the schizophrenic male to begin exhibiting symptoms as late in life as the early to mid-twenties. _

She refused to dwell on that suspicion too much, though. She'd rather think about him being into the Mob. They could get away from that, somehow. But how could they escape the demons in his own mind?

_You're overreacting, Katie, _she snapped at herself inwardly. _Jack does not have schizophrenia. He's not himself right now, that's for sure, but that doesn't necessarily equal schizophrenia. And even if he does have it, so what? You're a psych major, for Chrissakes; you know that there are new medications and therapies coming out all the time, and that most people are just fine as long as they take their meds. On the off chance he _is_ schizophrenic, you'll get him the help he needs. End of story._

Katie forced these unpleasant thoughts from her mind as she turned the corner. And there was the third big worry in her mind, right there to greet her, in black-and-white on the front page of the Gotham Gazette.

"**RED HOOD STILL AT LARGE**," the headline blared. "**GOTHAM POLICE BAFFLED**."

Katie shook her head with a grimace. The Red Hood. Who the hell had come up with that? Well, at least it was accurate.

Katie wasn't the only one who'd made her debut at the New Year's Eve Wayne Ball. So had the jerkoff now known as the Red Hood. He had struck again half a dozen times in as many weeks. He was an equal-opportunity robber; he had mugged a couple coming out of the symphony, broken into several homes, and held up a small mom-and-pop bank. Some dumbass reporter had dubbed him the Red Hood, since he always wore a red jacket with a hood pulled over the face, which was always covered in a ski mask. _They always have to romanticize every-goddamn-thing_, Katie thought irritably.

What bothered her most about the Red Hood was that he was apparently someone she knew. He had struck for the first time at Wayne Manor, and even during a party as large as that one, not just any Joe Blow could wander in from off the streets. He had to have gotten past security. He had to have been invited.

_Overreacting again, Katherine, _she warned herself. _Just because he was invited doesn't mean you knew him. You didn't know a good seventy-five percent of the people who were there, and still don't. And how many people were there? Easily three thousand. Them's mighty big odds._

But…most of the people who had attended the Wayne Ball were _rich._ There had been only a handful of guests there who didn't belong to Gotham's upper crust. And Katie did know every one of those people. Alex. Darren. Their dates. Jonathan Crane. A few other friends from school. And…Jack.

_OK, now you're just being ridiculous. Jack is not the Red Hood. He was with you almost the entire night, remember? _

But he hadn't been there when Destiny Parrish came screaming down the stairs. Where had he said he was? Oh, yes, he had been out by the pool smoking. Alex and Darren had vouched for him.

_Well, that doesn't necessarily prove anything, _a small voice in the back of her mind taunted. _Who knows how long the girl was out?_

_Probably not long at all, _Katie's rational mind argued. _Most people regain consciousness immediately after fainting. She probably woke up as soon as she hit the floor. There's no way anyone could have gotten from the third floor to the pool that fast._

_And anyway, the cops sure didn't seem to think it was him. They questioned him, yes, but they questioned everyone who was still there. And what did he do after they finished with him? Did he leave? No, he went upstairs to bed! You'd think if he had been the one he'd have wanted to flee the scene as fast as he could._

_And oh yes…there is the small fact that you _know _Jack. You know the man. You know he would never do anything like that to a helpless, scared girl. So maybe he's a little short-tempered these days. He's still a good, decent guy. He would never even think of doing such a thing. How would he feel if he knew you thought he was capable of something like that?_

_No, _she concluded, _whoever the Red Hood is, it ain't Jack. Hell, it probably _was _one of the wealthy guests. One whose wealth is dwindling, perhaps. Or maybe it's some kind of sick thrill thing. Whatever, I just hope they find the fucker before he hurts someone._

Katie was so lost in thought that she almost missed Jack's street. Quickly she turned and started down it, toward his building. Suddenly all she wanted was to be in his arms. To assuage her guilt…and to reassure herself.

--

The evening started well. Jack was in a good mood, and delighted to see her. He had made chili, his specialty, which she loved. After she gobbled a couple of bowls while they sat on the couch channel-surfing, she had pretty much convinced herself that she was overreacting to…well, everything. Maybe it was the pills. Her hormones were probably out of whack. Yeah, that would explain it.

They were watching a _Simpsons _rerun when Jack suddenly jumped up. "Hey, baby, I almost forgot," he said. "I have something for you."

"Ooh!" she squealed, clapping her hands like a little kid. "What's the occasion?"

"No occasion," he shrugged as he went into his bedroom. He returned momentarily with a Neiman-Marcus shopping bag. "Call it…an early Valentine's present." He handed her the bag.

She reached inside eagerly and felt something silky. She lifted out a negligee of royal purple satin, with black lace over the bodice and on the hem.

"I don't know why," he said as she gazed at it, "but it just grabbed my attention. I saw it hanging on the rack and I knew you had to have it."

Katie's brow furrowed. She liked the negligee. And it wasn't that he had never bought her lingerie before; he had, a few times, and she always enjoyed modeling it for him. It was one of their mutual turn-ons. He had even bought her a French maid costume around Halloween. They'd gotten some serious mileage out of that particular getup.

But none of the other lingerie he'd bought her had been expensive, and she could tell this was. The Neiman-Marcus bag was her first clue. And as she inspected the negligee she realized it was real satin, not a poly blend, and that the lace was silk, not nylon. She peeked at the label and saw it was French. She bit her lip. This was probably every bit as expensive as the earrings he'd given her for Christmas. And he had given it to her for no reason. How had he gotten the money for it, especially now that he was paying two-thirds of the rent and utilities? What was he doing? What the hell was going on?

She didn't realize she had spoken that last aloud until Jack suddenly ripped the negligee from her hands. "What do you mean, 'What the hell is going on'?" he snapped. "I bought you a fucking present, that's what's going on! And that's the thanks I get? If you don't like it you could have just said so!"

"I do, Jack!" Katie protested. Her heart was going like a jackhammer already. _Here we go again. _"I do like it! It's beautiful! I love it! It's just…just…"

"Just what?"

"It's just too much!" she burst out. "You don't have money for this kind of thing, Jack! At least, you didn't. I know something's going on. There's no way you've been making the kind of money you're throwing around at Guido's. What are you doing?"

In one swift movement Jack lunged at her, pulled her off the couch, and slammed her against the wall, hard. "I'm not doing anything," he hissed.

Katie was overcome by fury. "Bullshit!" she screamed into his face. He was so startled he almost dropped her, but quickly recovered. "What do you think I am, a goddamn idiot? What is it, Jack? Is it drugs? Is it the Mob? _What the fuck are you doing?_"

Suddenly there was a loud cracking noise, and a stinging pain across the left side of her face. She saw stars. _He hit me, _she thought rather calmly. _Jesus Christ, he just hit me._

She wanted to hit him back. She wanted to cry. She wanted to lift her face to the sky and scream at the top of her lungs until they burst. But shock was quickly setting in, and she could only stare at him, dazed.

He tightened his grip on her shoulders and thrust his face close to hers. "You listen to me, Katie, and listen good," he growled. "What I do is none of your goddamn business. It has nothing to do with you; it has nothing to do with us. I'm just trying to survive. A spoiled little rich bitch like you wouldn't know anything about that, but some people in this world have to get by however they can." His hands moved up to her throat and squeezed. "I _will not _be judged by you. Do you understand me?"

She tried to nod, but it was hard with his hands around her throat.

"_Do…you…under…stand…me?" _He punctuated each word by slamming her head against the wall.

"Yes," she finally managed to choke. "Yes."

He let go of her abruptly, and she slid to the floor, gasping. Her hands flew to her neck and massaged it. This couldn't be happening. It wasn't happening. It was all a bad dream. This wasn't Jack, not her Jack, not the man she loved. _"I love everything about you."_ It was…a pod person. Yes. That had to be it. _"You're beautiful."_ The real Jack was probably tied up somewhere, or else he was dead. But this was not the guy she had kissed and made love to and laughed with and planned to have a family with. _"I want to spend my life with you."_ He had won her a teddy bear, for Christ's sake. How could someone who had won her a teddy bear do this to her?

Katie was virtually as insane as Jack at that moment. She could only sit blankly, thinking crazy, disjointed thoughts, as she watched him tear the negligee to shreds in sheer rage. That apparently wasn't enough to satisfy him, so he grabbed his lighter and set it on fire.

She might have retreated into madness for good if she hadn't caught a flash of red at the corner of her eye. Instantly she came crashing back to reality. It couldn't be…oh dear God…

Slowly, trying not to attract his attention, she inched toward the pile of red material in the corner. As she got closer her stomach began to churn. It was a hoodie. A bright red hoodie.

She was within arm's reach of the thing when Jack realized what she was doing. "What the fuck do you think you're…" he began, but stopped dead as he stared into her eyes. They were hard, cold, accusing, and very nearly mad. The eyes of a stranger. He felt a faint breath of fear, and something else he couldn't name. Something he hadn't felt in a very long time. Was it…pain?

"You…" she spat. "You're the…" Triumphantly she grabbed the hoodie and held it up—then gasped. With sickening clarity she realized what she was holding.

It was Alex's Misfits hoodie. He wore it all the time. There was a Misfits logo patch over the breast, and a huge Grim Reaper on the back.

She swallowed. "Jack…I…"

"You thought I was the Red Hood," he said slowly. He looked at her as if he had never seen her before in his life.

"Jack, please…"

"You thought…" he repeated, then trailed off. Katie shrank back against the wall, but he made no move toward her. He spun on his heel and stumbled over to the couch. The ruined negligee smoldered on the coffee table. He paid it no mind as he collapsed onto the couch and buried his face in his hands. He didn't move for several minutes.

Katie finally managed to stand up. Tentatively she crept over to him.

"Jack…"

He lifted his head. She gasped at the look in his eyes. It wasn't murder or madness now, but bleak despair.

"Get out," he said in a monotone. "I can't believe you thought…I don't even know who you are anymore. Just…get out."

She didn't move. She wasn't sure she could.

"I SAID GET OUT!" he screamed suddenly, his face contorting with rage and anguish. She staggered backward in shock, and fell to the floor again.

"_No, Jack, please!" _she screamed, crawling to him desperately. He tried to shove her away, but she threw her arms around his legs and held on tight.

"Please," she sobbed. "I love you. Please don't do this."

He didn't respond. She buried her face against his knees and cried bitterly. She wept for the beautiful, kind, thoughtful man she had fallen in love with. She wept for the breezy, funny, happy girl she had been. Oh God, what was happening to them? How had it come to this? Later she would realize that her real deterioration began then, as she cried and clung to the man who had beaten her body and her soul.

Slowly she became aware of a light touch on her head. She choked back her sobs and held her breath, trying to determine what he was doing. Was he getting ready to smash her skull with something? Was he lighting her on fire?

He was stroking her hair.

She sagged against him in relief. "Jack," she wailed. "Oh, God, Jack, I'm so sorry!"

Wordlessly he pulled her up from the floor onto his lap. For a few minutes he just held her, cuddling and rocking her like he had so many times. It was the way he had always comforted her when she was upset. Vaguely she realized the irony of taking comfort from the man who had just hit her, but she was like a small child who, right after getting beaten by a parent, instinctively reaches for that parent. She didn't know who else to turn to. She _had _no one else to turn to.

Only Jack loved her. Only Jack cared about her. And she had come _thisclose _to losing him forever.

Tears spilled from her eyes as she looked at his still, unnaturally calm face. She might be losing him yet, she realized with terror. He had an eerie look about him…the look of a person who was going away inside himself. She had taken enough psych courses to know that everyone sometimes had to retreat from reality for a little while...but sometimes those who withdrew into themselves stayed there for good.

She had to reach him somehow. She had to bring him back, before it was too late.

She pressed her lips against his. He didn't respond, but she just kept kissing him. Desperately she moved her lips over his face and called to him, every few seconds pausing to plant another kiss on his unmoving mouth. She stroked his hair and patted his cheeks and tried to reassure him, telling him over and over again that she was sorry, she loved him so much, and everything was going to be all right. Her attempts to bring him back grew more and more frantic as he just sat there, motionless.

While Katie was performing her feverish ministrations, there was a battle going on inside Jack's head.

_She wants to give me another chance, _he thought. _She still loves me, even now. Dear God, what have I turned her into? When I met her last year she was so feisty, so tough. Vulnerable underneath, yes, but essentially strong. She never would have let anyone treat her the way I have. And now look at her. I've turned her into a clinging, sniveling little girl. Oh, Jesus, Katie, I'm sorry. I never meant for this to happen. Even before I really loved you this wasn't part of the plan._

_What are you bellyaching about? _said the voice in his head that he tried never to listen to.

It had been there all his life, but most of the time he managed to drown it out or at least ignore it. Lately, though, that was becoming harder and harder. The voice belonged to the cold, selfish, unfeeling part of him—the part of him that had decided to pursue Katie Wayne in the first place.

_She's all yours now. She loves you no matter what. Wild horses couldn't drag her away from you now. No matter what you do to her now she'll go right on loving you, just like a puppy. Isn't that what you wanted?_

_No, _the good part of him insisted. _All I wanted at first was the money, I can't deny that. But then I fell for her, and I wanted to have a real life with her. I wanted to make her happy._ _I never wanted to break her spirit. I never wanted to tear her apart like this. _

_Oh, well, _the other voice retorted spitefully. _Done-bun-can't be undone. No use crying over spilled milk. Look at her. She's pathetic! She's just as crazy as you are now._

_I'm not crazy! I'm not!_

_That's a matter of opinion, bub. You were nuts to ever listen to me in the first place. And yet you did, several times during your life. Oh, you always told yourself you had a good reason—justice, self-preservation, some kind of noble-sounding happy crappy. But that's where you made your mistake, Jacky-boy. Every time you listened to me I got a little stronger hold on you. I've been getting stronger…and stronger…and STRONGER. I'm going to beat you in the end, you know. I'm your dark half, your George Stark if you will. If you're smart you'll push that girl out the door and never go anywhere near her again. She might recover eventually from what you've done to her…but I guaran-damn-tee you she'll _never _recover from what I've got planned for her. _

_No! I won't let you hurt her! I'll kill myself before I'll let you near her!_

_Somehow I doubt that. You've spent too long looking out for number one to blow it at this stage in the game. You're slipping, though, bub. Eventually you're not gonna be able to take anymore. And that's where I'll step in._

"NOOO!" Jack screamed at the top of his lungs. "NO, NO, NO!"

His eyes were squeezed shut, and his teeth were gritted. His hands were balled into fists, and he punctuated each "no" by striking his legs so hard she winced at the pain it must cause. But he was back, and right now that was all Katie cared about.

"Jack," she said soothingly. "It's OK, baby."

He stared at her. _He's going to hurt her, _he thought. _He's going to make _me_ hurt her. He was right. I have to get rid of her. I have to push her away. It's the only way to save her._

Without warning he crushed his lips against hers so brutally she tasted blood. She struggled against him, but his arms snaked around her quickly and held her fast.

She was small and half in shock; he was a foot taller and much stronger. It was easy for him to wrestle her down onto the couch and pin her body underneath his. He tore at her clothes roughly, smothering her startled protests with his own mouth.

He was cruel that night. He took her hard and brutally, as though she were a prostitute instead of the woman he loved. He was so rough that he knew he hurt her a few times, although she didn't complain. She didn't say much of anything at all. He forced her to go down on him, and she did without protest. He ordered her to give him her ass—something he had never even asked her to do—and she complied. He drove himself into her as hard as he could, not stopping when she screamed into the couch cushions.

_Saving her, _he kept telling himself, _I'm saving her. She'll never want to see me again after this. This is the only way I can drive her away. I'm setting her free. I don't like doing this, not at all. _(This was a flat-out lie—his dark half, or maybe just his animal nature, relished her screaming and flailing.) _I don't like it, but I have to drive her away so she'll be safe._

Finally he had spent himself, and tore himself off of her. Deliberately he turned his back on her and began to pull on his jeans. It was a few moments before he heard her whisper "Jack…"

He plastered a scowl onto his face and turned to her, intending to snarl, "See why you should have listened when I told you to get out?" But the words died on his lips as soon as he saw her.

He had expected tears, or even anger. He hoped for the anger—it would make it easier to play his part and throw her out. But he hadn't expected what he saw.

She was lying supine on the couch, gazing at him through half-lidded eyes like a kitten who'd just finished a bowl of cream. Instead of fury or hurt, he saw on her slack, flushed face contentment and desire. He nearly groaned aloud as he realized that she'd enjoyed every minute of what he'd done to her. Her screams had been from passion rather than pain or fear, her wild thrashing meant to urge him on instead of to force him off.

He had failed. Worse still, he was glad he had failed.

"Jesus, Jack," she sighed. "I never knew it could be like that."

He didn't know what to say to that. So he said the first thing that popped into his mind: "I need a drink."

He staggered into the kitchen on wobbling legs and grabbed the bottle of Jack Daniel's in the top of the cabinet. He scrounged around and managed to find one clean glass—with Darren gone and he and Alex out most of the time, the dishes had been neglected for several days. The whole apartment had, for that matter. He poured himself a shot and tossed it back in one gulp. The warmth of the whiskey flooded through him, soothing him.

"Bring it in here," he heard her call lazily. "I could use a drink myself."

_No! _he wanted to scream. _You're not supposed to be like this! You're supposed to be terrified! You're supposed to be disgusted! You're supposed to be desperate to get away! I wanted you to hate me for doing that to you! I didn't think you'd actually _like _it! How am I supposed to save you now?_

He said none of these things. Instead he carried the bottle and the glass back into the living room, and they sat on the couch they'd just desecrated and proceeded to get totally and senselessly drunk. At least, Katie did, and Jack tried valiantly. But all he could do was sit there and think, _You weren't supposed to like it. You weren't supposed to like it._

Finally Katie passed out, the liquor and the night's events catching up with her. Jack decided to leave her on the couch. He went to his room and got a pillow and a blanket and took them back to the living room. He tucked the blanket tightly around her, then stood gazing at her silently. Her face in repose was beautiful, as innocent and childlike

as it had been the first day he met her, ten months and a lifetime ago. Thoughtfully, he took the pillow and held it gently over the sleeping face.

_Well, _jeered the voice of the dark half, _I guess there is one way to save her._

The voice shocked him back to his senses. Quickly he shoved the pillow under her head and ran back to his room, slamming the door behind him and locking it.

"No more," he said out loud, to both halves of himself. "No more."

He huddled on his bed fully clothed, curled tight into a ball. He remembered lying like this as hardly more than a toddler, listening to his parents scream, wishing Dad would leave Mom alone, hoping he wouldn't get tired of Mom and come in after him. At least in those days he'd had something to hold onto—a scruffy teddy bear given to him by Lily. He had loved that bear fiercely. He had slept with it every night until the day he slipped it into her casket, right before it was lowered into the ground.

He needed something to hold onto now. Perversely, only one thing could occur to him.

Reaching under the mattress, he pulled the red hoodie—the real one—from its hiding place. He folded it into a pillow and clutched it against him. It was almost like a teddy bear. He would have to remember to hide it again before Katie woke up.

"No more," he muttered again, before drifting into an uneasy sleep.

**A/N: Wow! You're still here? Great! Like I said earlier, this was probably the hardest chapter to write in the whole story. I have to say it was cathartic though. It wasn't intended to be therapeutic, it was an unexpected side effect, but hey, I'm not gonna knock it. Once again, a big hug and thank-you to everyone who's been reading and reviewing. Hope things aren't getting too dark and dreary for ya—but in a story about the Joker, where else is there to go really? Stay tuned—I'm working on Chapter 7, and I think we're going to find out how Jack got his scars.**


	7. And Now for A Brief Interlude

**A/N: OK, sorry guys. Sam, my muse, a troll who lives in my closet, informed me last night that we will not be learning about the origin of Jack's facial...nonconformity...until Chapter 8. He further informed me that Chapter 7 was to be a brief interlude in which a few of the other characters get a chance to share their feelings about the changes in Katie and Jack. I can't argue with the muse, so here goes!**

CHAPTER 7

Lexi Fox was worried. Ever since New Year's Katie had been going steadily downhill. At first she had just seemed tired, maybe a little depressed, and Lexi had figured her birth control was to blame. She had gone through something similar when she first got on the Pill, and it had taken her several tries to find one that worked for her.

But even after Katie had seen the gyno and been prescribed some different pills, she had continued slipping. She was still always tired, and now she was downright moody. She alternated between crying jags and temper tantrums. Lexi hadn't actually witnessed many of these mood swings, since Katie was spending virtually every free moment with Jack these days, but she had seen enough of them and heard enough of them over the phone to be concerned.

She wasn't looking so good, either. Always on the small side, Katie was now thin almost to the point of emaciation. Her once round, babyish face had become bony, her cheekbones sticking out so far you could almost grab them. She was paler than Lexi had ever seen her, and her eyes seemed permanently ringed with dark circles. She had always been a casual dresser, but now she skulked around campus wearing the same jeans and tops—usually turtlenecks—for days on end. Her once thick, glossy reddish-gold curls were always pulled back in her customary ponytail, but now they looked dull and usually unwashed. She looked, come to think of it, a lot like Jack these days. If not for the different coloring, they could almost have passed for brother and sister, or refugees from the same grunge band.

Lexi knew drugs were part of the equation. She knew Katie was smoking weed on a regular basis—she had smelled it on her more times than she liked to think about, and once had been absolutely sure that she was stoned right then, at ten o'clock in the morning. The weed wouldn't have worried her so much, but there were other days when Katie was so wired she almost seemed to be vibrating. Her eyes would be huge and her pupils miniscule, her hands gripped with a tiny, almost invisible trembling. On those days she talked too loud and too fast, the words practically tripping over her tongue, and laughed too much. Thad said it was speed, and Lexi figured he was right. She just hoped it wasn't cocaine.

The incredible thing was that Katie's grades were almost as good as ever. If her professors noticed there was something off about her, none of them said anything. There was no one to tell, really. She was eighteen now; her parents were dead; her cousin Bruce was halfway around the world; and Alfred wasn't an immediate relative or legal guardian, so they were bound by student confidentiality not to tell him anything. Lexi was desperate to confide in Alfred herself, but Thad forbade her. "That Jack Napier's a dangerous dude," he said. "You piss him off, there's no telling what he'll do. Besides, what's the point in worrying Alfred if he can't do anything about it?"

Jack. He was definitely part of the problem, too. But how much? At the very least he was an enabler; but Lexi was fairly certain he was more than that, that he might have been the one to get her started in the first place. He was looking and acting pretty off himself these days, so she knew whatever they were into they were most likely into it together. She couldn't figure it out. She had liked Jack a lot when she first met him. He had been such a charming, easygoing guy, and he had seemed to genuinely care about Katie. But he had changed. They both had. And while Katie's transformation just made her sad, Jack actually frightened her. She knew Thad was right: there was no telling what he would do if she pissed him off. So she kept quiet.

Alfred, too, sensed something was up. He rarely saw Katie these days, since she had practically moved in with Jack, but when he did see her the obvious changes in her alarmed and saddened him. The bubbly, vivacious young woman who had treated him like a grandfather or beloved uncle was now always distracted and lethargic, or else she was _too _bubbly, _too _animated.

He was worried about the young man, too. It would have surprised Jack to know that Alfred had become quite fond of him over the past year. He had had his reservations at first, but eventually he had realized that Jack really did care for Katie, loved her even. And as time went on he had come to admire and respect the young man's intelligence and obvious determination to make something of himself. Alfred missed deeply the days when Thomas and Martha Wayne were alive and he had a family to look after, and sometimes he would catch himself imagining Miss Katherine and Mr. Napier marrying, making their home at Wayne Manor, and filling the empty rooms once again with the laughter of children. He had hoped for that, even; he had never been blessed with children of his own, but he had raised Master Bruce and Miss Katherine and loved them like his own, and he had looked forward to becoming a _de facto _grandfather to their children.

But something had gone wrong along the way between the young miss and the man she loved. Something had gone terribly wrong. Alfred was loath to confront Katie directly. Like Lexi, he was apprehensive about Jack's reaction, and also he didn't want to risk angering Katie and driving her even further away. But he was seriously contemplating telling Master Bruce that he was long overdue for a visit home. When he saw the shape his young cousin was in, he was bound to do something, Jack Napier be damned. Bruce Wayne had faced worse than Jack Napier in his lifetime.

Someone else was worried, too. Someone else was keeping a watchful eye on Katie Wayne. In her constant drugged haze, she never noticed him shadowing her around campus and even off of it, but he was always there. Unlike Alfred and Lexi, this person cared not at all for the deterioration of Jack Napier; in fact observed his disintegration with a detached clinical fascination. But Katie's downfall—ah, that was another matter entirely. He had much more than a passing interest there. He was deeply concerned about her, but like everyone else said or did nothing. He was content to let matters perk along for now. He knew things couldn't last much longer as they stood. Soon, soon, Katie was going to need someone to lean on, someone to help her pick up the pieces of her shattered life. And he was going to be ready for her when that happened.

As the spring wore on the three people watching Katie grew more and more concerned. Lexi finally determined to talk to Alfred, no matter what Thad said and no matter what Jack did. Alfred made up his mind to call Bruce and flat-out order him to come home, if necessary. Only the man in the shadows decided nothing. He just kept watching. He could see the end was fast approaching.

The excrement was getting ready to hit the rotary blades. It wasn't going to be pretty. But none of the people who worried for Katie Wayne could know—indeed, ever did know—just how ugly the end was going to be.

**A/N: I know, I followed my longest chappie thus far with my shortest. I figure if uncle Stevie can pull it off, so can I. I'm already working on Chapter 8, which looks as if it may be just as difficult to write as Chapter 6. It may be several days before I update again. Then again, I plan to hit TDK again Friday night so hopefully inspiration will strike in the same place twice. As for this chapter, I'm sure you can all figure out who the nameless one is, but it just seemed right not to actually come out & say the name. BTW, does anyone get the troll-in-the-closet reference or do I need to move beyond my favorite high-school reading material? In the immortal words of Eric Cartman, "Ah love you gahs". **


	8. Good Night Jack, Good Morning Joker

CHAPTER 8

_Late spring._

It was the last day of final exams. Katie thought she had passed everything, but she could really give a shit less. Her thoughts, as they had been for the past few months, were on two things and two things only: her next Addy, and Jack.

He had told her when she left earlier this morning he would have some more amps by the time she got home. He no longer hid the fact from her that he was into drugs—selling, and frequently using. As a matter of fact, it had been she who asked him to bring her some amphetamines a couple months ago, when their nightly drinking and smoking sessions began to take a toll. She needed to keep up the boozing and rocking the ganj for anesthetic purposes, but she needed something to give her a blast for the next day. She remembered the girls at Heathrow who took amps; they had had almost boundless energy, breezed through their classes with seemingly zero effort, and practically run the whole damn school besides. She could definitely use some of that.

So it had been amphetamines she asked for, and amphetamines he brought her. "You know this shit's basically just speed," he had told her that first time, handing her the bottle of Adderall. She supposed he had been trying to warn her, but she was feeling so dragged out that day that she didn't care if it was plutonium in pill form, as long as it would get her going.

And they had worked. Boy howdy, had they! She had spent that entire first night cleaning the apartment from top to bottom, right down to scrubbing the floors, then sat down and knocked out a term paper she had been putting off that was due that morning. She knew right off that this shit was something special. Receiving a B on the last-minute paper had clinched it. _It's like magic, _she had thought. _This will get me through the semester, and then when summer comes I'll figure out what to do about…everything._

Only problem was, as time went by she developed a tolerance to what she called her "blue bombers", and needed more and more to get the desired effect. Also, the blue bombers were great for energy but not so good when one was trying to sit down and work through the problems in one's life. When she tried to think about the things that were wrong in her life, and how to go about fixing them, she succeeded only in becoming extremely agitated. The only way she could combat the extreme agitation was with a drink or three. Luckily there was always plenty of booze at the apartment now, along with various other depressants.

She realized, vaguely, that people were worrying about them—Alfred, Lexi, and Alex were at least. Most of her other acquaintances she had long since drifted away from. Alex was gone now, too. He had taken his exams early and headed back home to Pittsburgh. She alone knew that he wouldn't be back—he had told her before he left that he was transferring to Penn State. "There's just too much bad juju in Gotham now," he had told her. "Don't tell Jack yet, OK? I'll write him a letter or something once I get back home." She had promised not to tell him, understanding that most of the bad juju that Alex referred to emanated from Jack himself. She couldn't blame him for wanting to get away. Sometimes she wished she could escape herself.

But she couldn't leave him. She just couldn't.

She had never understood the girls she knew who stayed in bad, even abusive relationships. She had always thought herself much too strong-minded and proud to let a man beat her down. But now she understood how a strong-minded, proud woman could be reduced to a doormat—by love.

Fucking love.

At least ten times over the past few months she had resolved to tell Jack it was over, return to Wayne Manor, and put her life back together. At least a hundred times she had made up her mind to tell him they needed help, both of them, and to ask Alfred to help her investigate treatment options for the two of them. She knew he would have been more than willing to do so. But Katie was too frightened of Jack's reaction to come out and demand that they get treatment of some kind—and she was too in love with him to just walk away.

Her Jack, the one she had fallen in love with, was still in there somewhere. Sometimes he surfaced for brief moments. These moments were why she stayed.

The other man—bad Jack was how she thought of him—well, he surfaced sometimes too. But most of the time neither her Jack nor bad Jack were in residence. Usually he was Stoner Jack—calm, lethargic, and infinitely preferable to bad Jack. But while bad Jack surfaced rarely he could show up at a moment's notice. These days, Katie always walked softly where Jack was concerned.

_Maybe I need to try to talk to him again, _she thought. _It's summer now. We're out of school. He's not even pretending to work at Guido's anymore. Maybe I need to suggest that we go to one of Bruce's beach houses for a few weeks. The one in the Hamptons—no, never mind, that's too close to here; the one in Hawaii would be better. If I can just get him away from here for a little while, maybe I can convince him we can't go on like this. We could stay there and get clean—Alfred would find someone to help us, maybe even come himself. Hell, maybe we wouldn't even come back here. There are good schools on the West Coast. Maybe we just need a fresh start, somewhere far away from Gotham City._

She resolved to bring up at least the idea of Hawaii tonight, knowing even as she did that she wouldn't. Jack could still read her like a book. He would know right away that she had an ulterior motive for the trip. He would figure out that ulterior motive without much trouble, too. And then—she didn't want to think about what might happen then.

_Well, I'll keep thinking, _she told herself as she turned into the parking lot of his building, never knowing that things were about to come to a most inglorious end.

--

He was waiting for her, with a fresh supply of blue bombers as well as a bowl of excellent Colombian Gold. After smoking the bowl they engaged in what she privately referred to as "strange puppet sex" (having come up with the term after they watched _Team America: World Police_ in the early days of their relationship).

This was part of the reason she stayed as well, she admitted to herself as she rode him like a bucking bronco, her head still floating with the cheeba. As downhill as things had gone for them in, well, every other area, the sex had actually improved. She had never thought she could love it more than she did in the early days, when he was so tender and gentle. She would never have believed he could use her as brutally as he had that night a few months ago—and she would never in a million years have dreamed that she would enjoy being used that way. But he had ravished her, and she had liked it, even loved it. Their coupling now was always rough, always tinged with S&M and sometimes more than just tinged with it, and she couldn't get enough. She was addicted to it.

"How was your day, baby?" she asked lazily after they were both spent and sprawled naked across the bed, passing a blunt back and forth.

"It was all right," he told her between tokes. "I went and picked up Falcone's shipment"—she was too high to wince at the name of Gotham's premier crime lord—"and made a couple of deliveries. He let me keep a couple ounces of this as a bonus." He indicated the blunt as he handed it back to her.

She toked a little too hard and went into a coughing fit. "So Carmine Falcone's a humanitarian in his way," she said once she could talk again. "Who'd a thought?" There was something else she'd meant to ask him about—what was it? Suddenly it came to her. "And your exams?" she asked. "How do you think you did on them?"

He didn't bat an eyelash. "I didn't go."

"WHAT?" Katie lost her buzz instantaneously.

"I had that shipment to pick up," he pointed out.

"Well, couldn't you have rescheduled that or something?" As soon as the words were out of her mouth Katie realized the stupidity of them.

"Baby, you don't reschedule with Carmine Falcone," Jack said with exaggerated patience. "He reschedules _you_—permanently. Besides, I was failing anyway. The finals wouldn't have made any difference."

"So you flunked out, basically," Katie said dully. She was shocked, although she didn't know why. She should have known that he was too busy with his new extracurricular activities to keep his grades up as she had done.

He shrugged, seemingly unbothered. "Basically."

"No more scholarship, then," she stated. "Well, I'll scrounge up some cash for fall semester—"

He cut her off. "I'm not going back to school, Katie."

"Why the hell not?" She could hear the belligerence in her tone. Damn her temper—it was going to get her in trouble again, she could feel it. She half expected him to backhand her right then.

Surprisingly he didn't. "I'm working for Falcone now," he explained as if talking to a five-year-old. "I don't have time to fool with all that anymore."

That did it. She didn't care what he did to her now. "I see," she said sarcastically. "So you're just going to throw everything away to be a low-level Mafia grunt?"

She felt him tense, and caught a flicker of annoyance in his eyes. But he was still restraining himself admirably. "I'll move up, Katie," he said evenly. "Falcone likes me. He says I've got potential. In time I'll make more money working for him than I ever would have as a lawyer."

She exploded.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" she screamed. "Is that all you care about? Money? Who the fuck _are _you? Does it not matter to you at all that you could be thrown in jail or beaten to death or—oh, God, all _kinds _of awful things could happen to you! Don't you care?"

"No, I don't care," he snapped. "I can't afford to care. I swore to myself a long time ago that I would do whatever I had to to get out of being goddamn fucking poor, and I meant it. Do you know what it's like to be poor, Katie?"

She did know. She had spent the first five years of her life poor. He seemed to have forgotten that. She opened her mouth to remind him, but he didn't give her a chance.

"Do you know what it's like to go to bed hungry? Do you know what it's like to use candles and sleep in three layers of clothes in the dead of winter because Mommy couldn't pay the electric bill? Do you know what it's like to never, _ever _have a single toy or piece of clothing that hasn't been previously owned? Do you know what it's like to go to school and see the other kids with their nice houses and their expensive clothes and their mothers who don't have to work two jobs just to make the rent on a goddamn roach motel? Do you know what it's like to have those kids laughing at you—or worse, _pitying _you?" His voice rose steadily until it was a scream. _"Do you know what it's like to bury your sister in a fucking potter's field in a pine box? We couldn't even afford a real casket, not even the cheapest one they had!"_

He had to stop to take several deep breaths. When he resumed, his voice was marginally calmer. "I shouldn't have expected you to understand. I don't know why I thought you would. I figured when I set my sights on you that you would be just like any other spoiled little rich bitch. But then I met you, and you were so…so _real_, and I thought, I hoped you might be able to understand. But I guess there are just some things…" He trailed off as he realized her expression was one of slowly dawning horror.

"You…_set your sights _on me?" she asked, the incredulity in her voice almost as awful as the hurt in her eyes. "You…_targeted _me?"

What was left in him of Jack Andrew Napier screamed in agony…but the other part of him chuckled merrily.

"Katie," he said helplessly. He reached for her; she jerked away from him. "Katie, I…"

"I should have known," she said tonelessly after a moment. He saw with something close to terror that her face was now completely blank. "Maybe I did know, deep down. But I didn't want to believe it." She laughed mirthlessly. "Lexi tried to warn me, you know. But I was _just…so…sure _that you weren't like all the others." The smile on her face was frighteningly false.

"Katie, no," he pleaded desperately. "You don't understand—"

"Oh, I understand quite well," she interjected. "There's just one thing that puzzles me, _Jack_." He flinched at the venom with which she spit his name. "If you've been planning to live off me all along, why go to work for Falcone? I would have given you as much money as you needed; you must have known that. In fact, I offered to help you out several times, but you always refused me. And then you hooked up with that lowlife. Why?"

"Because I love you!" he exclaimed. "I _do _love you, Katie! I'll admit I was just after the money at first, but then I fell in love with _you! _I was telling you the truth last fall when I said I don't care about the money! I don't want your money, not anymore! I want to take care of you myself!"

"By becoming the next Michael Corleone?" she asked, unmoved by his outburst. A great and terrible calm had settled upon her. "Or more likely the next Tony Montana? No thanks, Jack. If that's your idea of taking care of me, I don't want it. I'd rather go back to being 'goddamn fucking poor' as you so eloquently put it."

He could only sit helplessly as she rose and began to dress. Suddenly she froze, and he had a wild thought that maybe she was coming to her senses, maybe she realized that he was telling her the truth now and she would forgive him. But she wasn't looking at him, she was looking at the side of the bed, and as his eyes followed hers he saw the red sleeve dangling from underneath the mattress.

Watching him watching her, Katie actually saw the sanity leave Jack's eyes. Some minute thing just snapped behind them, and for a moment they were completely blank. He bowed his head briefly, and she thought dispassionately that he might have slipped into catatonia. But then he looked up at her again, grinning, and those dark brown eyes were glittering with madness. Bad Jack was back again.

"You weren't ever, uh, supposed to see that," he said, and his very voice was different now—high-pitched, inflection off, enunciation overly exaggerated. "That Jack never has been much of a—_housekeeper_. Well, what can ya do?" He gave an exaggerated shrug.

She was rooted to the spot. She couldn't move; she couldn't speak. He cackled.

"Why, Lil Miss Katie Wayne, you look like you've seen a, a _ghost _or somethin'!" he exclaimed cheerily. He was off the bed and towering over her in one swift move. "Tell me, darlin', _why so serious_?" He let out another shriek of laughter at her quick indrawn breath.

"Oh my God…" she whispered.

"_Ohmigod, ohmigod!" _he mimicked. "Well, that's not my name, honey-bunch, but if you _insist_…" He leered at her.

This wasn't happening. This couldn't be happening. There was no _way _he was a multiple personality, the condition quite possibly didn't even _exist, _and anyway she would have _known…_She was shaking.

"Oh, you're _frightened_," he cooed, reaching out to stroke her face. She jerked away from his hand and began backing away. "Ah, ah, let's not be like that," he chided, matching her step for step. She slammed into something hard—the dresser. Instantly he was pinning her against it.

"Sexy little Katie," he whispered. "Ya know, I didn't think you'd be _any_ fun in the sack, you were just so _virginal_ at first, and of course poor sweet little Jack treated you like a fuckin' _china doll_…and then he finally couldn't take it anymore and treated you like _I _told him to, and whaddayaknow? Little Miss Prim-and-proper turned out to be a _nympho…_and a _masochist_ besides!" He grinned evilly at her.

She was fumbling along the dresser, trying to find something, anything, to defend herself with…

"And after I gave him such good advice, do ya think he ever let me out to play with you?" His lips twisted into a mock pout. "_No_, he did _not_! But," he was smiling again as he pressed himself even harder against her, "I'm here now."

Her fingers grazed against something—a bottle!—and she gripped it, slowly raising it…

"Ya know darlin', if you liked _Jack _in the sack so much, you're gonna _love _me,' he told her. "I'm gonna have to…_take care of ya _afterwards of course, but there's no reason we can't—"

He was cut off by the sound of shattering glass. "What the—" he began.

She swung the bottle neck at his face with all her strength, only to falter at the last minute. Instead of slicing his face to ribbons, she only managed to tear open his bottom lip. Apparently he was impressed by her show of bravado, though, giggling wildly even as blood poured down his chin.

"Oh my _dear_!" he cackled. "I didn't think you had it in you! You've got some _balls_!" His grin faded suddenly. "You, uh, hesitated, though. You shouldn't never hesitate. You shouldn't never _hesitify!_ " He screamed with glee at that, then grew serious again. "I really can't _believe _you _did _that, Katie-did."

"I'm sorry," she whispered feebly.

"Aw, gosh, it's just a scratch, Rocky!" he giggled. "Ya wanna know what your sweet little lover baby _Jack _did to somebody's face once?"

"No," she whispered. "Please, I just want to go home. I promise I won't tell anyone about…anything."

"Oh, don't puss out on me now!" he said. "Here, let's get comfortable," and with that he tossed her back onto the bed. He picked something up off the dresser—oh, God, it was a shard of glass. "I'm gonna need a…_prop _for this little tale." He flopped on the bed beside her, snuggling next to her in a grotesque parody of the cuddle sessions they had once shared. Well, no, _they_ hadn't shared. This might be Jack's body, but this sure as hell wasn't Jack.

"Pay _atten-shun_!" he barked suddenly, jolting her out of her not-quite-sane inner monologue. He smacked her cheek lightly. "_Ooohkay, _here we go. Once upon a time there was a little boy named Jack…"

She nearly gagged with fear as he began to trace the shard of glass lightly over her face. But soon she was even more terrified by the story he had to tell her.

"And Jack had an older sister named Lily. Oh, Lily was beautiful, Lily was smart, Lily was kind…why, Lily was just about perfect! Lily had one fatal flaw, though, shared it with their mother…she had rotten taste in men.

"When Lily was oh, about fourteen, she fell in love with a neighborhood punk named Tino. Now this Tino was bad news. He was already eighteen, and he was a leader in one of the two-bit local gangs. He had a criminal record as long as your arm, he ran drugs, the whole nine yards. But he was _just so cute_!"—he squealed this bit like a little girl—"And Lily was a hopeless romantic. She thought she could _change _him, you see.

"I'm sure you can guess what comes next. It wasn't long before Tino was using Lily as his own personal punching bag. Night after night Lily would come home covered in blood, bruises, even the occasional broken bone. And yet she continued to put up with it…because she _loved _him. And he was always _just so sorry_ afterwards."

He paused to mop some of the blood from his chin. Katie hadn't noticed till now that both of them were soaked in it. "Now, who does that sound like?" he exclaimed. "No wonder poor old Jack wigged right on out…the parallels are just _uncanny, _dontcha think?"

He didn't give her a chance to answer. "Anyway, so as time went on, and Tino just kept on and kept on rearranging her face when he took the notion…well, Lily fell out of love pretty fast. But she still stuck by him. Only now it was because she was _scared._

"Even with all this shit going down, however, Lily managed to keep her grades up. When she was seventeen she found out she'd gotten a full scholarship to UNJ. She realized she could get out; she could start a new life. She finally grew a pair and told Tino it was over.

"Well, you know how Tino took that."

He paused for a long moment. Without warning he suddenly jabbed her with the glass hard enough to make her scream.

"Just makin' sure you were still with me," he chortled. "Back to the story. So now poor little princess Lily was dead, just like Snow White. Only no kiss was gonna wake her up.

"And poor little Jack was just devastated. Lily had been more of a mother to him than their real mother had ever been. All the sweetness, all the kindness in his little life was gone, just like that. So Jack decided he was gonna find Tino…and he was gonna make him pay.

"Jack kept his eyes and ears open, and before too long he had managed to find out where Tino was hiding. An abandoned building just a few streets over…_not _very _smart, _huh? He shoulda left _town, _at least.

"So one night brave little Jack headed out to yon abandoned building with such weapons as he could scrounge. As luck would have it, old Tino was under the influence when he got there. Jack was young, but he was strong…and he was _mad. _He didn't have any trouble subduing old Tino, and he sure went to town on him!

"Do you know what a Chelsea grin is, Katie?"

She shook her head wordlessly.

"No, I didn't figure you would…well, after Jack was finished helping Tino see the error of his ways, he was struck with an inspiration. He had heard about Chelsea grins from Tino and his gang…seems some of the big-time players liked to give them out to people who needed a little, uh, _lesson. _So Jack took the razor blade he'd swiped from the five and dime, and…look at me, Katie. _Look at me!"_

No way was she gonna cross him now. She looked. He had jammed the glass into his mouth ...what the fuck was he...

"He made a little cut _here_"—she nearly fainted as he made a sudden savage upward cut at the corner of his mouth—"and a little cut _here_"—she tried to scream as he did the same to the other side of his mouth, but she didn't seem to have any air—"and then he kicked old tough-guy Tino in the gut as hard as he could, just to make him _screeeam_." He opened his mouth wide on that last word, and the gashes at the sides of his face yawned accordingly. Blood literally leapt from them, spraying everything at close range, including Katie herself.

She found her voice. "Oh God, Jack, oh my God, what have you done, what did you _do,_ I can't fix this, this can't be fixed, oh Christ Jack your _face_—"

He chuckled deep in his throat. "Jack?" he said. "Jack is dead, my friend. You can call me…_Joker._" He grinned widely, and the blood that had slowed to a trickle gushed once again. "And as you can see…I'm a lot happier."

Suddenly he was on top of her, holding the bloodied glass to her mouth. "Now…let's put a smile on that face!"

She didn't fight. She just laid there and waited for him to do what he would. Her Jack was gone, for good it looked like, and she didn't really want to be alive anymore. Hadn't for some time, to be honest. She just hoped the end would come quickly. She squeezed her eyes shut and waited for the sudden searing pain.

It never came. Instead she heard a voice she had never expected to hear again say "Katie."

It was Jack's voice, _her _Jack's voice, and the eyes in the mutilated face were Jack's eyes, and both the eyes and the voice were filled with sorrow.

Her own eyes filled with tears. "Jack…" she whispered.

He pushed himself off her. "Go, Katie," he told her. "Run. I don't know how long I can hold him off."

She wept, even as she stood and grabbed for clothes, any clothes, hers or his it didn't matter. She had managed to pull on her jeans before she saw the hood; now she hastily donned her shirt, shoving her feet into the first shoes she came to. She hauled ass to the front door, but just like Lot's wife she couldn't help looking back.

He was hunched over on the bed, his bloody face a mask of anguish. "KATIE, GO NOW!" he screamed.

She went. The last thing she heard as she slammed the door behind her and fled into the night was the sound that would haunt her nightmares for the rest of her life—the sound of his maniacal laughter.

--

Katie never fully remembered the next few hours. She knew that she wandered around the worst part of Gotham for quite some time, and often wondered how she had managed to be left alone and not mugged at the very least. She never realized that while she wandered she was talking to herself.

Not just talking to herself. She was a one-woman show. She mumbled, and she yelled, and she cried, and several times she laughed every bit as crazily as Jack—no, the _Joker _had.

Something broke in Katie Wayne's mind that night, and she would never be quite right again.

She came back to herself a little around dawn. She realized that A) she was roaming aimlessly through the mean streets of Gotham, B) she was damn lucky to be alive, and C) Jack was still out there somewhere, quite possibly looking for her—only he wasn't Jack anymore. She didn't think he ever would be again.

Which brought her to: D) she had to get somewhere safe. Fast.

Fighting the rising panic, she started toward a relatively well-lit and populated all-night diner. She would call Alfred, she decided. Alfred would come get her. But as she prepared to cross the street a car horn blared behind her. "Katie!" a male voice bellowed.

She almost peed her pants. Oh shit. She was too late. He had found her. Oh shit.

But wait…the voice was familiar, but it wasn't Jack's. Who _was _that?

A hand grabbed her arm. She screamed. The hand spun her around, and she almost collapsed with relief as she stared into the electric blue eyes of Jonathan Crane.

"Jesus Christ, Katie!" he exclaimed. "What on earth are you doing walking around the Narrows at this hour?" His face filled with alarm as he took in her appearance. "You're covered in blood!"

"It's not mine," she managed to say.

That seemed to reassure him an infinitesimal amount. "Get in the car," he commanded. She obeyed without protest. After the night she had just had she probably would have gotten in the car with Charles Manson if he told her to.

"What _happened_?" he asked once they were both in the car and headed out of the Narrows. A perfectly reasonable question, to be sure. But where to begin?

"Jack…" she started. A line from her childhood favorite movie, _Mrs. Doubtfire, _occurred to her. "Jack had a little accident." A giggle escaped her like a hiccup.

Jonathan nearly rammed the back of a school bus. "Oh shit," he gasped. "You didn't…hurt him, did you? Is he…" He hesitated.

"He hurt himself," she said. "And no, he's not dead, if that's what you're asking. At least, he wasn't when I left."

"_What happened?" _he repeated.

Exhaustion suddenly swept over her. "Look, I really don't want to talk about it right now," she told him, trying to be polite—after all, he might have just saved her life. "I'm grateful you pulled me off the street and all, but right now I just want to go home. To Wayne Manor," she clarified.

"Well, I'm taking you home," he retorted, "but not to Wayne Manor. I'm taking you to my place."

She snorted. "I see. And how are you going to explain _that _to Mommy and Daddy?"

He shot her a death look. "I don't live at home," he said shortly. "I moved into an apartment at the beginning of this semester."

"Oh, even better," she rejoined. "The dashing young psychiatrist-to-be takes the bloody damsel in distress back to his swingin' bachelor pad. And what, pray tell, are you going to do with me there?"

"I'm going to throw you in the shower and force a Valium down your throat," he snapped. "Then I'm going to let you sleep for as long as you want because you obviously need it, then I'm going to make you eat something because you obviously need _that_, and then I'm going to find out what the hell is wrong with you and figure out what kind of help you need and how to go about getting it!"

"Oh," was all she could say to that. Suddenly she felt very small.

They drove in silence for a few minutes. Finally she said, "I'm sorry."

"It's all right," he said. "You're…distraught."

She tried to smile, but it looked more like a rictus. "That's putting it mildly."

Jonathan lived on the top floor of a graceful old Victorian on a quiet side street in the nicer part of town. It wasn't all that far from Wayne Manor, Katie realized. The apartment was spacious and airy—they must have knocked out some walls and added some windows—and the appliances, while not new, were immaculately maintained. The place was tastefully decorated, if a bit too austere for her liking, and almost compulsively neat.

"Nice place you got here, sport," she chattered as he led her inside. "It's just what I—"

All of a sudden the floor came rushing up to meet her before darkness swallowed her.

--

When she came to she was lying on the incredibly comfy overstuffed sofa, and Jonathan was wiping her face with a wet washcloth.

"Now it's my turn to ask what happened," she said groggily.

He smiled a little. "You fainted," he told her, stroking her forehead with the cloth. Katie couldn't help a small sigh of pleasure. She had forgotten how great this feeling was. No one had wiped her face with a wet washcloth since Alfred, when she was small and had suffered a gnarly bout of stomach flu. Even Jack, as sweet as he had once been, had never done this for her.

Jack…

_No, _she told herself. _I'm not going to think about that right now._

She forced herself to listen to what Jonathan was saying. "You cracked your head pretty good, but I think you'll live. You're going to have a lump, though."

"'s all right," she murmured sleepily, burrowing into the couch. Ooh, he had put a down throw over her, too. Heaven. Bliss. Even her clothes felt better—instead of grungy and stiff with blood, they felt almost like flannel…

Wait. They _were _flannel.

Jonathan caught the tiny puzzled frown on her face. "I changed your clothes," he said apologetically. "I didn't…look at you or anything, but I had to get those others off of you. They were just…yecch." He shuddered. "I had to throw them away. I don't think there was any chance of salvaging them. I didn't really have anything to fit you, so I just put on some lounging pants and a T-shirt." He sounded almost shy as he added, "I hope you don't mind."

"Not at all," she said over a yawn. She really didn't. She couldn't believe she felt this good after being so miserable just a short while earlier. Maybe Jonathan Crane wasn't quite as much of a prick as she'd thought. He might actually make a good psychiatrist, she thought with a fuzzy sort of wonder as she drifted off. If he could heal as well as he could comfort…

--

"_Let's put a smile on that face…"_

"NO!" she shrieked, bolting upright.

A light clicked on. For a minute she wondered where the hell she was, then remembered as she saw the sleepy face of Jonathan Crane.

"Katie…" he said, his voice thick with sleep. "Is everything all right?"

She tried to answer, but she was crying so hard she nearly choked.

"Katie," he repeated, wide awake now. His voice was firm, but gentle. "Katie, calm down. You're safe now. Can you calm down and tell me what's wrong?"

She did. Somehow, she managed to summon the strength to tell him everything. All of it. From Jack's first blowup in the fall to the horrific events of the previous night. She didn't leave anything out. Not the fact that he had targeted her from he beginning. Not the fact that he had been the one who killed his sister's boyfriend. Not what he did to his own face as he told her the story. When she finally finished talking her throat was dry.

"My God," was all Jonathan could say. He was genuinely concerned about Katie's mental well-being after the ordeal she had gone through, and of course he thanked God she had escaped alive and physically unscathed…but a small, craven part of him couldn't help thinking _What a case study this would make._

"OH, JONATHAN, IT WAS SO HORRIBLE!"

It was a howl of grief and terror and unimaginable pain; and it brought him back to himself. Before he quite knew what he was doing he was sitting on the couch with her, and she was weeping in his arms.

"It's all right," he said soothingly. "It's all right, darling." _Darling? _Where had that come from?

She didn't seem to notice, though, or care. "Jonathan," she choked, raising her tear-streaked face to his. "Jonathan, somebody has to help him."

Their faces were practically touching. Suddenly he wanted nothing more than to cover her mouth with his own, and leave it there until those awful heart-rending tears stopped.

Instead he rose. "You're right," he said briskly. "I'm going to call 911 right now." He fairly ran to the kitchen, praying to God she hadn't noticed the sudden hardness in his groin.

After he made the call (and employed the infamous tuck method), he returned to the living room. His breath caught in his throat at the sight of Katie in the soft light. God, she was beautiful. Even now, _especially _now, she was beautiful.

Right then Jonathan made a vow to himself.

_You're safe now, Katie, _he thought. _I'm not ever going to let anyone hurt you again._

"I'm going to be all right now, aren't I, Jonathan?" she asked suddenly. He jumped. It was almost as if she had read his mind. "I'm going to be safe now." She smiled at him. It was a small, trembling smile—but it was a real one nonetheless.

"Yes," he said with perfect calm while his heart did wild flip-flops in his chest. "You're going to be safe now." _No matter what I have to do to keep you that way._

--

Six weeks later the headlines of the Gotham Gazette trumpeted the news:

"**WAYNE HEIRESS ELOPES WITH FELLOW PSYCH STUDENT!"**

**A/N: Oh. My. God. Chapter 6 was a cakewalk compared to this one. I finally made it, though—can't say I enjoyed the journey, really, but I made it. Hope everyone has an easier time reading it than I had writing it.**

**As I've stated before, as far as I'm concerned Heath **_**is **_**the Joker. However, I grew up on Jack Nicholson's Joker and still have love for him too…so I had to honor him by 'borrowing' one of my fave lines of his. I'm sure you all knew it when you saw it.**

**Sooo…Katie is Mrs. Jonathan Crane now. What is it with this girl and hot guys with serious issues? Is she some kind of magnet or what? Don't worry all, Jonathan was a little OOC in this chapter but trust me, it's not gonna be all bunnies and fluff for the newlyweds.**

**Once again, "Ah love you gahs". **


	9. Portrait of an American Family

CHAPTER 9

_In which three years have passed._

Jonathan Crane, soon-to-be MD and current intern at Arkham Asylum, used his most soothing, rational voice to try to convince the unruly patient to follow orders.

"Now, darling, the dinner is supposed to start at seven o'clock. It's four-thirty now, and you know you'll need at least two hours to get ready. So why don't you hop out of bed and pick out one of your pretty dresses to wear, and I'll have Emma draw you a bath."

The patient didn't argue, but neither did she move to obey. She simply lay in bed and stared at him blankly. If he didn't know better, he would almost swear she was catatonic. Finally she spoke. Her voice was barely above a whisper.

"Do I really have to go, Jonathan?"

At least she was speaking. Maybe he wouldn't have too hard a time with her tonight. "Darling, this is a very important dinner. I'm going to be receiving an award, and people will wonder if you're not there to cheer me on." He allowed a hint of pleading to creep into his voice. "I know you don't like going to these things. That's why I don't ask you to unless it's very, very important—like tonight." He almost had her, he could tell. So he went in for the kill. "You need to be seen out and about occasionally anyway, darling. You don't want people saying you're…mentally ill, or a recluse, or some such." He paused deliberately. "You don't want Lily to hear that kind of talk, do you?"

It worked. It always did. Katie heaved a huge, gusty sigh, and with great effort got up from the bed. "You win," she said wearily. "Can't have people saying my kid's got a crazy mother."

_Even though she does? _Jonathan couldn't help thinking, even though he was instantly sorry. Crazy was not a word for a doctor to use. And anyway, Katie wasn't really crazy. Depressed, yes. Introverted, definitely. Becoming entirely too dependent on various medications, probably. But not crazy.

And she wasn't always depressed, or introverted, or pilled out. When she was with the child, she was almost the same lively, exuberant girl he had known a few years ago. He was thankful for the child for that reason, even if…he shook himself out of his reverie and gave her an approving smile. "Thank you, darling. I'll have Emma come up and help you get ready."

As he went downstairs to find the maid he reflected on the past few years. Their hasty marriage had been the talk of Gotham. After all, he was not exactly known as a ladies' man, and Katie _was _known to be quite seriously involved with Jack Napier. But Jack Napier had seemingly vanished into thin air. When Katie's pregnancy became obvious, it was generally assumed that Napier had gone AWOL upon finding out about his impending fatherhood, and that Jonathan had stepped in to play the white knight and make an honest woman of the abandoned mother-to-be. Others speculated that Jack had caught Katie with Jonathan, and fled Gotham in heartbreak or disgust. Jonathan preferred the second story himself—it portrayed him as something of a stud, which was gratifying, and more importantly inferred that he was indeed the father of tiny Lily Katherine Crane.

Only a handful of people knew the real story, and even that handful didn't know nearly all of it.

Emergency workers had arrived at Jack Napier's apartment to find the place ransacked and virtually blood-soaked, and the man himself nowhere to be found. Of course that little detail never saw the light of day, nor the evidence that suggested Napier had been the Red Hood who'd been terrorizing the city at the time, nor the fact that he'd suffered a psychotic breakdown and carved his own face like a jack-o'-lantern. The Gotham PD had kept everything under wraps and out of the press. Releasing the information would have embarrassed the Wayne family, and no one wanted to do that. The Gotham police force knew which side its bread was buttered on.

So as far as the public was concerned, Jack Napier had either deserted his girlfriend and unborn child or slunk out of town after being cuckolded. No one had seen or heard from him for three years—not his mother in Atlantic City, not Alex Martinez, not the happy Wayne-Crane family. Jonathan assumed he was dead, that he had committed suicide or been killed by Falcone's men. He didn't know Katie's theory; after that terrible morning she had never spoken of Jack Napier again, at least not to him.

Even when she told him she was pregnant they had avoided the subject. He had simply asked her how far along the doctor thought she was, and she had responded "He said approximately six weeks". That told him all he wanted or needed to know: while the baby could have been fathered by Jack Napier, there was also a chance that it belonged to him, Jonathan Crane.

After Katie had told him the whole story, Jonathan had suggested to her that she stay with him for a few days; after all, she was in a fragile mental state, and would soon be detoxing to boot. Who better to help her through it than a psychology student who was currently doing clinicals at Arkham Asylum, where he had access to medications that could get her through both? She had agreed.

The second night she had had another nightmare. Once again, he had gone in to comfort her; once again, he had ended up holding her while she cried; once again, he had felt the urge to smother her crying with a kiss. Only this time he had acted on the urge.

He was shocked, couldn't believe he was doing this, and he fully expected Katie to push him away in disgust. Instead she had returned the kiss hungrily, almost desperately. He knew it was wrong, knew she was in a bad way emotionally and he was taking advantage of that, of _her_, knew she was returning his embrace not out of lust but a need to feel safe and cared for and comforted. But even as the knowledge flashed in his mind his hands were sliding under and up her nightgown, and after that he stopped thinking, only doing.

They had been sleeping together regularly ever since. This meant, Jonathan reasoned, that there was at least a fifty-fifty chance that it was his child Katie carried. And even if it was Jack Napier's, Napier would never know. He was most likely dead, and even if he was still living he was insane. From what Katie had said, an alternate personality had emerged in him; he might not even remember her by now. At least, Jonathan hoped that was the case.

"What do you intend to do?" he had asked her. "Are you going to keep the baby?"

She had smiled then, a secret sort of smile, and he had noticed for the first time how well she looked. She had put on a little weight, and some of the healthy pink had returned to her skin. He had assumed it was getting off the amphetamines that had wrought the changes in her, but now he wondered if the pregnancy was part of it as well. She almost looked like her old self, unless you looked into her eyes. The eyes were very different—more gray now than blue, the impish glint in them irrevocably gone. (Only Lucius Fox realized that her eyes now bore a striking resemblance to Thomas Wayne, Senior's.)

"Oh, yes," she had answered him that day. Absently she had laid a hand on her stomach, as if caressing the life within. He didn't think she was aware she had done so.

"Well," he had responded with his usual icy controlled calm, though inside he was a nervous wreck, "if we marry now we can always say the child was premature."

She had looked startled. He knew marriage had probably never entered her mind. But he had her now, and he intended to hold onto her.

"My parents would kill me if I had a child out of wedlock," he had rushed on. "It wouldn't be easy for you, either. You're still very fragile right now. You need someone who can care for you, and for the child. I really think this would be the best thing, Katie."

And once again, she had agreed. He had hit on that very thing she needed most right now—to be taken care of. To be safe. He had known that would sway her.

And he was still taking care of her to this day, he thought as he told the maid that Mrs. Crane would like a bath drawn now. Taking care of her and the child. He had kept his promise. He had just never realized all it would entail.

They had married just a day after that fateful doctor's appointment, at a small chapel in Niagara Falls. They had honeymooned there, too. The only really clear memory he had of their wedding day was of filling out the paperwork before the ceremony. That was when they had discovered one another's middle names, or rather Katie's lack thereof.

"You don't have a middle name?" he asked when he saw that Katie had filled out the corresponding section with "None".

"I will in a few minutes," she had replied with a hint of her old wryness. It had taken him a minute to figure out what she meant.

"Who doesn't give their child a middle name?" he had wondered aloud. Even now he couldn't say why this bothered him, but it had.

"My parents were not the most imaginative of people, from what I recall," she had said matter-of-factly. "They named me Katherine in the hope that it would cut some future ice with my grandfather. Which it did, I suppose, but not in the way they had planned. I guess coming up with a middle name was just too challenging."

"Well, what did they call you when you got in trouble?" he had pressed. "I mean, every time I did something bad my mother would screech 'Jonathan Andrew Crane!' and I knew I was in for it."

She had grinned then, looking more like the Katie Wayne he had met a year and a half ago than she had in the past six weeks. "Well, until I went to kindergarten I thought my name was 'You little shit'," she responded. She had laughed, but Jonathan had felt a chill go through him. For the first time it had occurred to him that she never spoke of her life before her parents had died—and that maybe that was a good thing. Perhaps she had dealt with abuse at other hands before Jack Napier's. It would explain why she had stayed with him for so long.

He was so busy psychoanalyzing that for a moment he didn't realize Katie was asking him a question. "I'm sorry, darling, my mind wandered," he said. "What did you ask me?"

She had the oddest look on her face. "What did you say your middle name was?" she had repeated.

"Andrew," he had replied. "It's a family name. Why?"

She looked like she had seen a ghost, he thought. For a moment she didn't respond. Just when he was becoming concerned, she had relaxed and said, "No reason. Andrew's a good name. If we have a boy let's name him that."

"My parents will like that," he had said, and then the JP's wife had come out and said he was ready for them, and that had been the end of the conversation.

The little one had arrived in late February, just missing being a leap year baby by half an hour. When the nurse had handed Katie the tiny girl with the thin fuzz of reddish-gold hair, his wife's eyes had shone with love and something like triumph as she announced, "Lily. Her name is Lily Katherine…Crane."

He had spent the last two years and some-odd months convincing himself she had almost said "Wayne". But sometimes when he looked at the girl he couldn't help thinking, _was she going to say Wayne…or Napier? _He never knew where Katie had gotten Lily from, and he never asked. Several times he had almost Googled the name "Lily Napier" just to see what would come up, but at the last minute something always stopped him. _You don't want to go opening Pandora's Box, Jonmy, _he told himself. _Katie's yours. The child is yours—at least as far as the world is concerned. That'll have to be enough._

But were they? Were either of them really his?

That was the question that haunted his thoughts; the question he feared would never be answered.

--

Emma worked her magic, as she had countless times before. At promptly six-thirty Katie descended the staircase, transformed from a disheveled semi-invalid into an elegant, stunningly pretty young woman of a certain station. He smiled at her with real approval as she came toward him.

As she came closer, however, he grit his teeth together, although the smile stayed in place. She had taken something. He knew that glitter in her eyes, that almost-imperceptible trembling in her hands. Damn it. He kept his office locked at all times; how did she keep getting in there? If he didn't know better he would suspect Emma or Lily's nanny, Mrs. Travers, but they were both well aware of "Mrs. Crane's troubles" and attempted to keep an unobtrusive eye on her. Well, at least she was getting it out of his office rather than on the streets; she rarely left the house these days. Still, he couldn't wait until he officially joined the staff of Arkham and received an office there. He would keep everything there then, and she could only get her hands on what he saw fit to give her.

"You're looking a little…hectic, darling," he murmured. His face and tone were as calm as ever, but he was undoubtedly pissed. She could read it in his posture, which was even stiffer than usual, and in his frozen smile.

"Back off, Jonathan," she muttered. "I'm going to this damn thing, just as you asked. You never said I couldn't take anything before I went."

"How did you get in there?" he snapped, keeping his voice low so no one would overhear. "What do you do, pick the lock?"

"As a matter of fact, yes," she replied without missing a beat. "The locks in this pile are strictly Mickey Mouse. If anyone ever decides to break in we'll be fucked. Tell me, Jonathan, why don't you change the lock if it bothers you that much?"

"What's the point?" he said disgustedly. "You'll just pick that lock too, or break the code, or start buying them off the street. God, addicts are so damn relentless."

He saw the anger flash in her eyes, but she didn't argue. She knew as well as he did that she was hooked on amphetamines. She didn't take them every day, not like she had before. But anytime they were going to something like this, even if she had resolved not to, she always found herself rooting through his desk, "running for the shelter of her mother's little helper" as the song went that she couldn't get out of her head at those times.

She drowned out the guilt and shame with her talent for rationalization. He knew how hard it was for her now, knew that some days she couldn't even get out of bed, not even for her daughter, who she adored. He usually understood, and very rarely asked her to attend social events with him. Why couldn't he see that she _had _to have something to get her through the few times she had to appear in public? Why couldn't he see that she needed to be on autopilot, to be able to function but not really have to think—because thinking brought back all the memories, all the wonderful memories that so quickly became painful? He gave her tranquilizers sometimes; he gave her antidepressants—why not something to get her up every now and then?

"Well," he said in the resigned tone that told her the matter would be swept under the rug for the time being, "shall we head out?"

"I'm ready if you are," she replied. "Oh, wait, let's stop in to see Lily first. I promised her we'd come say good night before we left. You know she likes to see us all dressed up."

_I think she likes to see you any way except flat on your back in bed, _he thought, _and as for me…I think she could care less whether she sees me at all. _Once again, guilt flooded him immediately. He knew Lily's indifference toward him, like her close bond with her mother, was a direct result of his ambivalence about her. So he said, "All right," even though they were running late as it was, and they went to the nursery.

They were living in Jonathan's childhood home now. His father had died suddenly just before Lily's first birthday. His mother had remarried rather quickly and was now living in Paris with her new husband, a French nobleman. Until several months ago Jonathan, Katie and the baby had lived in the top floor of the Victorian. Sometimes he wished they'd never left that apartment; while not perfect, things had been better there. Katie had really started to go downhill after they'd moved into the house, for some reason. He had no way of knowing that the graceful three-story brownstone was exactly the home she and Jack Napier had once dreamed of.

The nursery was on the first floor, and actually consisted of a bedroom, playroom, and bathroom. All three rooms had been decorated in shades of lavender and pale green. Katie had supervised the decorating herself. When she got involved with anything these days, it was almost always something to do with her daughter.

Surreptitiously, Jonathan watched Katie enter the nursery. The change in her was immediate and profound. Her smirk relaxed into a genuine smile; warmth flooded into her eyes. Even her voice seemed to change as she said, "Hi, there, Curly Locks."

Lily Crane, aged two years and three months, instantly abandoned the tea party on the go at the child-sized French provincial table and flew to her mother. "Mommy, you're _beautiful!_" she squealed.

Katie swept the little girl into her arms, heedless of her silk dress. "And so are _you_," she told her. "You're also smart, and sweet. You're awfully _short _though."

Lily giggled as she gave the standard answer to the familiar exchange: "But I'm gonna grow!"

She was everything Katie had said she was, Jonathan mused, except short. Lily was actually tall for her age, with long, slender bones. Other than that, she was almost an exact replica of her mother. Seeing them together, Jonathan felt a faint breath of something not far from love.

As usual, his inner voice picked that moment to speak up: _She's built just like Jack Napier, isn't she? And isn't Katie crazy about her? Would she be as crazy about her if she were _yours? He winced. Why? Why he couldn't he get rid of these thoughts?

Mother and daughter took no notice of him as they laughed and babbled nonsense at one another. "Well, what all have you been into today?" Katie asked. "Have you been running Mrs. Travers ragged?"

The nanny smiled. "Oh, no," she said. "She's been a dear, as usual." Mrs. Travers had come to them when Lily was a newborn, while Katie was in the grips of a rather severe case of postpartum depression. Alfred had actually found her for them. She was the widow of a friend of his back in England. She reminded Katie of Alfred in a lot of ways: Mrs. Travers was reserved and inscrutable, but loyal, and above all she adored Lily. And the feeling was mutual. Katie saw a lot of her younger self and Alfred in their relationship, and she was happy that her child had two grandparent figures, at least.

Jonathan cleared his throat. "Katie…" he said.

Katie made a wry face. "Duty calls," she said to Mrs. Travers. She gave Lily a kiss before handing her back to the nanny. "Good night, Curly Locks," she told her little girl. "I won't be home in time to tuck you in, but we'll spend all day together tomorrow, how 'bout that?"

"Can we go see Alfred?" Lily asked.

"I think we can arrange that," Katie said. "Of course you just want to pop in and say hi, right? You don't want to go swimming or anything while we're there."

"I do too!" Lily's grin lit up her face. God, she was so much like her mother…at least, the way her mother used to be. Jonathan found himself hoping that nothing would ever happen to _this _child to take the laughter and life out of her.

As if sensing his thoughts, the little girl turned to him shyly. "Bye, Daddy," she said.

He forced a smile. "Good night, Lily," he said, stepping forward and planting a quick kiss on the child's forehead. Mrs. Travers watched the proceedings with her usual bland expression, but there was something in her eyes…Not for the first time, Jonathan wondered just how much the nanny knew, or guessed, about the family she worked for.

--

The dinner was a resounding success. Katie gave an Oscar-caliber performance, she was bubbly and charming and totally adoring of her husband. When Jonathan was presented the "Outstanding Intern of the Year" award, no one clapped harder or cheered louder. When he excused himself during dinner, he overheard several conversations about them on the way to the restroom. He was pleased that no one mentioned Katie's supposed illness or Jack Napier, at least not in his hearing. As far as the world was concerned, the Cranes were just another happy young married couple on the way up.

When they arrived home, Jonathan, flushed with triumph at the evening's success, wanted to make love. Katie wanted to preserve his jovial mood and avoid any further discussion of the pills, so she acquiesced.

He wasn't a bad lover, Katie reflected as she lay under him. He had obviously researched sex as thoroughly as he researched every other subject. But while he was good at the technicalities, he was…what was the word for it..._uninspired. _Yes, that was it. There was pleasure to be had in his arms, but no passion, no spontaneity. He wanted to do it the exact same way every time. Once, after Lily was born, she had suggested that they mix it up a bit—have sex in the shower, for example, or even better, he could rough her up a little.

Jonathan had been shocked at the first suggestion, outright horrified at the second. So she had dropped it. They continued to couple, when they did, in bed, under the covers, missionary-style. She was surprised he didn't want the lights off while he was at it. As time went on even these sheeted gropings became more and more infrequent, until she could count on one hand the number of times they screwed in any given month.

He was a prude, she concluded. You wouldn't think a soon-to-be psychiatrist would be sexually repressed, but he most certainly was. So most times they joined she did what she knew was a sinful thing: she closed her eyes and thought of Jack.

Not Jack as he had been at the very end, but the Jack she had fallen in love with, the one she had given her virginity to. That first time was the one she fantasized about the most. He had been so wonderful. She had loved him so much. But had he ever loved her at all? Had the seeds of his madness been blooming even then?

Obviously thoughts of Jack weren't going to work tonight, so she just laid there and hoped Jonathan would be done soon. Right then, by sheer dumb luck, he hit her G-spot, and she cried out and bucked underneath him. This capped off Jonathan's perfect evening and triggered his own climax.

Afterward, he went to sleep almost immediately. Katie wasn't so lucky. It was almost dawn before she managed to drift off.

--

It was the worst dream yet.

_He was in the nursery—he was in the room with her little girl!_

"_Jack!" she shrieked. "What are you doing?"_

_He was drenched in blood. The gashes at the sides of his mouth were livid. "I came to visit my kid," he shrugged. "It wasn't very nice of you to keep her away from me, Katie-did."_

"_I did what I had to do," she retorted. "And anyway, she might not be yours at all. She might be Jonathan's."_

_Blood spurted from the cuts as he laughed. "Oh, my poor little delusional Katie," he said. "We all know who the chef was that put the bun in your oven! Jonathan knows—why else would he be so stiff around the kid? Why do you think he always remarks on how tall and skinny she is? And you see more than that, don't you? Everyone says she looks just like you…but you look at her and see my chin…my jaw…my mouth." He cackled riotously at this last._

_Katie's heart stopped. "Jack," she breathed. "What have you done?"_

_Suddenly there was a knife in her hand, and just as suddenly the knife was plunged deep into his chest. "What have you done?" she screamed as he crumpled to the floor. "What have you done?"_

"_Mommy…"_

_Katie whirled, terrified of what she was going to see. But it was all right. Lily was fine. He hadn't hurt her._

"_Katie…" came a strangled gasp from the man at her feet._

_She looked down and screamed. It wasn't the mutilated madman who lay at her feet, but Jack as he had been when she first met him, whole and unscarred and sane. His dark brown eyes were filled with agony as he looked up at her. "Why?" he asked, blood bubbling at his lips with the word._

"_Jack!" she cried, dropping to her knees beside him. "Jack, I'm sorry! I didn't know! Don't leave me…oh, God, please don't leave me again…"_

_It was no use. His eyes closed as his head rolled to the side. "Jack, I love you!" she wept, but he was past hearing her now._

_She went to hold her daughter—their daughter, the one thing she had left from him. But the little girl backed away, those eyes so much like her own glaring daggers at her. "You killed my daddy!" Lily shrieked accusingly._

Katie awoke with a muffled cry. She hadn't been too loud this time; maybe she hadn't awakened Jonathan. But just then the bedside lamp clicked on, and there he stood with a glass of water and a bottle of pills.

"Another dream." It wasn't a question.

She gulped and nodded miserably.

"It must have been bad," he said, not sounding sympathetic or even particularly interested. "You were screaming and thrashing so I thought you'd wake the whole house." He handed her the glass, then shook one pill out of the bottle and held it out to her. "Here."

She took the pill, not even looking to see what it was. Valium, she guessed. He usually gave her Valium after one of her dreams.

"Thanks," she croaked hoarsely after she swallowed it.

"You're welcome," he replied as he got back into bed. "Katie…" She winced, knowing what was coming.

"This can't continue. I really wish you'd talk to somebody."

"Jonathan, I can't," she said helplessly. "I…just can't."

"I know you think…bringing it all up again would just make things worse. And maybe it would, for a little while. But I think it would help you in the long run. There's a new psychologist at Arkham, Harleen Quinzel. She's young, and she specializes in post-traumatic stress syndrome. I think you'd like her."

"I'll think about it," she promised, as she had countless times before.

She heard him sigh. "Will you really think about it this time?" he pressed. "If you won't do it for me, at least do it for Lily."

Damn, he always had to do that. "I'll _think _about it, Jonathan," she repeated, unable to keep the edge out of her voice.

"Please do," he said crisply. "You're getting worse, you know. I'd hate to have to involuntarily commit you, but…"

The Valium was already hitting her, and she was too drowsy to be alarmed. "You wouldn't do that," she mumbled as her eyelids slammed shut.

When he was sure she was out, Jonathan rolled over and gazed at his wife. She was right, damn her.

Katie might have been surprised to know that her husband really did love her in his way. Whether the knowledge would have helped their marriage was anyone's guess.

In the beginning he had been full of hope. He knew she didn't love him, that she'd married him on the rebound, but he'd been confident he could change that. With time, he had told himself, she would begin to heal, to move past the nightmare she'd gone through with Napier. He would be infinitely patient and loving with her during the healing process, and eventually she would realize that he really did care for her. Once she saw that he loved her and cared for her more than Napier ever had, she would grow to love him in return, and ultimately they would have a happy and successful marriage.

Jonathan smirked. Even a budding psychiatrist was capable of deluding himself at times.

Still, even now, he loved her. And even now, in spite of himself, he waited for her to come around and realize that this was so. The rational part of him knew it would never happen, and that she would most likely continue to deteriorate without professional help. But even if that came to be, Katie Wayne Crane would be safe from Arkham or any other psychiatric facility. Jonathan knew he would never, ever put her away. He would die first.

"I love you," he whispered to the sleeping woman who had captured his attention years earlier, when she bopped into the Behavior and Experience classroom at Gotham U with a Ramones T-shirt and an insouciant air…and who had captured his heart in blue velvet at a New Year's Eve ball some months later.

"I wish you could see that."

**A/N: Sorry it's been so long between updates, but things have been crazy lately. I've been moving, work has been hell on wheels, and I've been battling a lovely summer cold. I'm jacked up on Sudafed right now, as a matter of fact, so if this chapter seems a little off you know why. Once again I'd like to thank my readers and reviewers and to let y'all know not to worry—Jack/Joker will be popping up very soon! He's going to have a few words for the not-so-happy couple, and none of them will be "Happy birthday". Muahahahaha…**


	10. Dedicated to the One I Love

CHAPTER 10

It was the damn song. The song had ruined everything.

Up until they played that song—and the dedication after it, which Jonathan supposed had really triggered everything—it had been an unusually good evening. Maybe the best evening they had had since they moved into the house.

Jonathan's spirits had begun to lift as soon as he walked through the front door at precisely five-fifteen, just as he did every weekday evening. Tonight had been different from most evenings, though. Instead of coming into a hushed, darkened house, the child in the nursery under the care of her nanny and Katie upstairs prostrate with the shades drawn, he entered to sunlight and the sounds of Aerosmith and Run-DMC.

He had found his wife in the kitchen stirring something in a saucepan and singing along to the radio; Lily played at her feet with a bigger pot and wooden spoon._ "She told me to WALK THIS WAY! Talk this way!" _Katie sang while Lily accompanied her on the "drums". The child actually had a good sense of rhythm, Jonathan noticed as he entered the kitchen with a genuine smile on his face. Perhaps they should consider music lessons when she was a bit older.

"Hello, darling," he said as he kissed Katie lightly on the cheek. "I see we have our own little Mozart." He patted Lily's curly strawberry-blonde head. The little girl grinned up at him and began to play a particularly energetic solo.

"Hey," she greeted him in return. "Yeah, Lily's been trying out different careers all day. First she was an Olympic swimmer at Wayne Manor when we went to see Alfred, then we stopped by Lexi and Thad's and she was runway modeling in Lex's studio, and now she's trying her hand at rock stardom, apparently."

This was good news. Katie had been out of bed and out of the house for a good part of the day, from the sound of it. Perhaps she was pulling out of the depression a bit, getting ready for one of her good phases.

He was even more encouraged when she told him, "I gave Emma and Mrs. Travers the evening off. They hadn't had one in a while, and I'm feeling pretty good today."

She looked good, too. Dressed in shorts and a T-shirt, her hair pulled back and her face free of makeup, she could have passed for a teenager again. She and Lily were both the light, toasty cinnamon shade that they went after a short time in the sun. How was it, Jonathan wondered idly, that the two fair-skinned redheads tanned, while he himself fried in the sun? It was one of life's little mysteries.

"I'm glad to hear that," he said. "What's for dinner?" Whatever was bubbling in the saucepan smelled mouth-watering, and he was ravenous. He _did _hope Katie wasn't the chef, however. After three years of marriage, Katie was no better a cook than she had ever been. He had to give her credit for trying, though, at least when she was in one of her good periods; his own mother hadn't even been able to boil water.

"Pasta primavera," she replied. "Don't worry, Emma made it before she left. I'm just reheating it." She aimed an impish grin over her shoulder at him, and his breath caught in his throat. For that one second, she was completely and fully happy-go-lucky Katie Wayne again. He hoped against hope that she really was getting better, but he had learned to just enjoy the good times when they came and not to read too much into them.

"If you and Keith Moon there want to head on outside," she said, indicating Lily, "I'll bring this out in just a sec. It's such a pretty day I thought we'd eat out on the terrace. I've already set the table and everything."

It was a pleasant dinner, one of the few they'd had in the house. Normally Katie had a tray brought up to her, while he gobbled something down in his study and Lily ate in the nursery with Mrs. Travers. But tonight the three of them ate at the little table on the terrace, with candles flickering and the radio playing softly in the background. They conversed about their respective days. It was, Jonathan thought later, too good to be true. Something had been bound to go wrong.

Katie and Lily had had a very busy day, it transpired. They had gone to Wayne Manor as planned late that morning, and stayed for lunch—"Alfred already had the cook making that chicken salad Lily likes so much; I swear I think he's got a touch of the psychic about him." He had been delighted to see the two of them and couldn't believe how fast Lily was growing. Lily had stayed in the water so long she looked like a giant prune when they finally coaxed her out of the pool. Katie wanted to get her into swimming lessons, but they didn't start giving them until age three; she would sign her up early next year.

After leaving Wayne Manor, they had stopped to see Lexi Fox Marshall. Now a fashion designer beginning to enjoy some success in the Gotham arena, she was happily married to Thad and mountainously pregnant with their first child. The baby boy was due any day now, and because Thad had a pathological fear of all things bloody and gory, Lexi had asked Katie to be with her during the delivery. Katie had promised she would. This was also a good sign, Jonathan thought. From there they began reminiscing about Katie's pregnancy and the birth of Lily. They concentrated on the lighthearted memories (Jonathan going out at three in the morning because Katie absolutely _had _to have some nachos; the hospital room being so filled with flowers and balloons that it took several orderlies to carry it all out), skipping over the less pleasant recollections (the child's murky paternity; Katie's spiral into postpartum depression). Lily listened to these stories with the attention span of a child three times her age, occasionally making them laugh with her cute remarks.

It was the best evening Jonathan could remember for a long, long time. But he wasn't going to disturb the fragile camaraderie of it by saying so.

After they ate, Katie cleaned up the dishes while Jonathan astounded all three of them by offering to read Lily a story. Lily accepted his offer with shy thanks. Her eyes held an expression of wonder as they settled on the living-room sofa with a well-worn copy of _The Cat in the Hat. _Neither of her parents wanted to examine her awe at a normal family evening, but they both promised themselves there would be more of them in the future.

Jonathan strung out his reading in order to coincide with Katie finishing the dishes. He was amazed at the little girl's comprehension and insight to the story. She really was a bright little thing, he thought as she giggled at his attempt to do a different voice for each character. Once again that breath of affection stirred inside him.

_Well, of course she's smart, _jeered his inner voice. _There's a lot of intelligence floating around in that little gene pool. We'll just overlook those raving-lunatic genes for now, right?_

_That's true, _he thought back at the voice. _Katie AND I are both very intelligent. And situational mental illness isn't hereditary. _Thankfully, the voice fell silent.

Lily was yawning as he closed the book. Katie, finished with the cleanup, had stood in the doorway listening to him read the last few pages. With the innate sixth sense of mothers, she lifted the child from his lap and took her to her nursery, despite the child's drowsy protests of, "Not sleepy, Mommy." By the time she had changed Lily in her nightgown she was nodding on her feet, and her eyes closed as soon as Katie tucked the blankets around her.

"Love you, Curly Locks," she whispered, brushing her daughter's wild reddish-blonde curls off her forehead. "I love you more than the sun."

"Love you more than the sky," Lily groggily retorted. This was their good-night dialogue, and dated back before the little girl's memory.

When Katie came back to the living room Jonathan was nowhere to be found. She thought he might have retreated to his office and then heard him moving around the kitchen. In there, she was surprised to find him at the cappuccino machine.

"Here," he said, handing her a cup.

She took it, sipping gingerly at the steaming liquid. "Thank you."

They sat at the kitchen table and drank their coffees. Not a word passed between them, but the silence was almost comfortable for a change.

He broke it finally by saying, "You do seem better."

"I think I'm getting there," she replied.

He pushed his cappuccino aside. "There's something I want to talk to you about," he said seriously.

_Oh, shit, _Katie thought. _He's going to start in about the therapist again. _She braced herself.

But it wasn't that. What he said next came as a complete surprise.

"Katie…" he began, then trailed off. He seemed to be searching for the right words. When he spoke again, his voice was soft and uncertain—as different from the "Professor Tone" as night from day.

"If you really are getting better…once we're really sure you're, you know, _well_…I'd like to start trying to have another baby," he finished in a rush.

She was really glad she didn't have a mouthful of cappuccino when he said that.

"I see," she said finally.

"I've always assumed we would have more than one child…and I think we should do it before Lily gets too much older," he told her. "Have you given any thought to this?"

"No," Katie said with perfect honesty. "I haven't."

"Do you want another baby?"

"I don't know," she replied, also truthfully.

He reached across the table and took her hands in his, surprising them both. She didn't pull away.

"It will be different this time, Katie," he said in a low voice, his blue eyes so intense she felt like he was burning a hole into her. "You'll have plenty of help…Mrs. Travers will be here, and we can hire another nurse when the baby comes, if you want. As for the postpartum, I'll monitor you closely, and get you medication or counseling if you need it. Then again, you may not. Every pregnancy is different, and you won't have the…stressors you had with Lily.

"You don't have to say yes or no right away," he concluded. "Like I said, I want to make sure you're all right before we start trying. But will you think about it?"

Slowly, she nodded.

"All right then," he said briskly, jumping up. "Would you like to see what's on TV? We can order a movie off Pay-Per-View if there's something you want to see."

She smiled. Her lips felt numb. _Another baby. _"Sure," she said. "I think _The Departed _is on one of the movie channels; I've been wanting to watch it, it's supposed to be really good." Her smile felt more natural now. "I'll make us some popcorn if you want to go find what channel it's on."

She mulled over this new development as she stuck a package of Orville Redenbacher in the microwave. _He wants to have another baby._

He had been quite delicate about the matter, but she could read between the lines. He wanted, not just another baby, but _his _baby—a child that was irrefutably, without a doubt, his own. They still weren't sure about Lily, and he had never wanted to do any kind of testing to make sure. She had offered after Lily was born, but he had refused. The little girl shared her blood type, so there was no way of knowing from that alone.

To this day, Katie was unsure about the true parentage of Lily Katherine Crane. Sometimes, in certain lights, her daughter looked so much like

_(Jack) _

_him _it took Katie's breath away. Other times, she seemed like a mini Jonathan. So it was impossible to know just _who _had fathered her. Katie admitted to herself that if she were to find out, she didn't know which outcome she'd want…finding out Lily was Jonathan's…or finding out she was _his._

So Jonathan wanted a child he knew for certain was his. She couldn't really blame him. And, after all, didn't she owe him that much? The guy had pretty much single-handedly saved her sanity three years back. He had saved her reputation, too, by marrying her. She liked to think she didn't give a damn about her rep, then or now, but deep down Katie Wayne Crane was an old-fashioned girl. More importantly, he had raised Lily as his own, even though he had never quite warmed to the child.

Maybe that would change if they did have another baby. Maybe his joy over having a child that was definitely his would help him feel more fatherly toward Lily. He had never once been unkind to her, after all, just distant. And she thought he might already be coming around, if tonight was any indication. She had seen the wash of tenderness over his face as he read to Lily. He did care for her, if he would allow himself to feel it.

A new baby. Without realizing she was doing so, Katie smiled. She would have to think about it some more…but if they _did _decide to have another one, she hoped it would have Jonathan's eyes.

The microwave beeped. Katie grabbed the popcorn between her thumb and index finger and dropped it quickly on the counter to cool. She was searching for a bowl when a snatch of music drifted in from the open window.

She frowned, puzzled. Then it came to her. _Damn, I left the radio outside. _"I'll be right there," she called to Jonathan. "I forgot to bring in the radio."

As she stepped onto the terrace a thought niggled at the back of her mind: _Wait, didn't I turn it off before—_the thought went unfinished as she heard the song that was playing: "Psycho Killer" by the Talking Heads. She used to love this song, she thought idly as she stepped toward the table and the radio. Not now, though. Now it just reminded her of…everything.

Right then, one of those moments of horrible serendipity occurred.

Just as she was reaching to switch off the radio, "Psycho Killer" went off and the deejay started yammering away. "The Talking Heads by special request, from Jack to Katie!"

She froze, her hand still on the dial. No. _No. _It couldn't be…

"Katie," the deejay continued, and she jumped before realizing he was "out there in Radioland", "Jack said to tell you you better not have forgotten him…because he certainly hasn't forgotten you!" The deejay laughed raucously, apparently thinking he was Howard Stern or Mancow. "If I were you, honey, I'd move outta town and change your name!"

Idiotically, she responded. "Somehow I don't think that would help," she told the radio.

--

When Katie hadn't appeared in the living room after a couple of minutes, Jonathan went looking for her.

"Darling?" he said, poking his head into the kitchen. The popcorn lay on the counter, but Katie was nowhere to be found.

He went out to the terrace then. At first he didn't see her, and he started to get alarmed. Then he barely made out her dark shape sitting at the table in one of the chairs.

Relief passed through him briefly, but was quickly replaced by apprehension. She was so still…she was sitting there like a statue, like she had after Lily was born. Like she laid in their bed now, so often.

_Oh, shit, Katie, _he thought wearily. Carefully he made his way over to her. "Katie?" he said in his Soothing-Patients voice. "Are you all right?"

She raised her head slowly, and he gasped aloud. A death mask looked back at him. Her face was drained of all color, all animation, and her eyes were enormous, dark and wild in the white face.

"He's back, Jonathan," she said tonelessly. "He's coming for me."

"Who?" he breathed.

He saw a flicker of impatience in those crazed eyes. "_You _know," she said. "Jack." She shivered slightly. "I always knew he'd be back one day."

Jonathan's blood turned to ice water. He didn't believe her ramblings for a minute, of course; he thought she was suffering another nervous breakdown. Guilt flooded him. _It's my fault, _he thought. _She was doing so well, and I pushed her over the edge…the thought of another child was just too much for her._

His voice carefully neutral, he asked her, "What makes you think that, darling?"

"The radio," she said in that scary flat voice. "'To Katie from Jack'. He hopes I haven't forgotten him…because he hasn't forgotten me."

"You heard a dedication," he realized with relief. "Oh, darling. There are probably _thousands _of Jacks and Katies in Gotham County. Two of them are bound to be dating each other. It was probably some teenager requesting a song for his girl."

She grinned. It was just as frightening as the death mask had been. "Not _that _song," she said in an eerie singsong. "'Psycho killer…_qu'est-ce que c'est…_far far far far far, far far far far far far better….run run runnnn, run run run awaaaay'!" She began to laugh then, a quiet chuckle at first, but it quickly spiraled into peals of insane, mirthless laughter.

Jonathan Crane had never been more frightened in his life. This was not his wife. This was a stranger…a madwoman. This had to be stopped. He had to fix this. He did the only thing he could think of, something he had never been taught at Gotham U or Arkham: he drew his hand back and slapped her squarely, ringingly in the face.

She stopped laughing then. She sat perfectly still and silent for one long moment. Then the shivering began.

She shook so hard that her teeth chattered. It was a warm summer night, but when he went to put his arms around her he could feel she was ice-cold. Stricken with remorse for the slap, relieved it had helped somewhat (and deep down exulting that he'd finally had an excuse to deliver it after three years of putting up with her shit), he led her inside.

Inside, she was docile as he prepared the syringe full of a fairly strong sedative and injected her with it. The Professor was in control now. He was going to get her calmed down, then he was going to figure out what the hell had set her off this time. He began to lead her to the stairs and thought better of it. It was silly, he knew, but if Katie was right…if Napier really _was _back…it was best to stay close to Lily.

So he tucked the stumbling mannequin that was Katie into the daybed in Lily's playroom. Luckily there was a table and chair right outside the nursery. He quickly retrieved the phone and the Gotham County phone book and sat down, preparing to make some calls.

First he would call the radio station, and find out of there was any truth to her ramblings. If there was, he would contact the police. If not…he might just have to call Arkham.

"Goddamn it," he huffed under his breath. A casual observer would have seen only annoyance and resignation on his face. It would have taken a very close look indeed to realize that the ice-blue eyes were wet with unshed tears.

--

Outside, the man in the shadows had tears in his eyes too. But these were tears of laughter.

Oh, it had worked out perfectly. The dedication had been a shot in the dark; it had been pure luck she had come out in time to hear it. But she had performed admirably. She had reacted just as she was meant to.

He had watched with glee the entire scene that followed. He'd had to stifle his laughter when the Scarecrow had gone upside little Miss Katie-did's head. He bet neither of them would get any sleep tonight. And that was just how he wanted it.

Now he would lie low for a while. He would let them think it was just a fluke thing. He knew it would take Katie a while to relax, but he could wait. He'd gotten very good at waiting over the last three years.

Not like Katie. She hadn't wasted any time making a baby and settling down to play house with the Scarecrow. He hoped she'd enjoyed the domestic bliss while it lasted, because very soon it would be _over._

He would bide his time, give things a chance to calm down…and then he would strike.

"I'll get you, my pretty," he whispered, giggling wildly. "I'll get _you…_and your _Scarecrow…_and just maybe I'll get your little _Munchkin, _too!" He let out a cackle at this last, and every dog on the street began to bark.

Inside him, the not-quite-dead corpse of Jack Napier let out a tormented, utterly helpless scream. The Joker ignored this. He had gotten very good at ignoring Jack's ineffectual shade over the last three years, as well.

He would have dearly loved to stay and observe more of the chaos he had created in the Wayne-Crane home, but it was time to put the next part of his plan into action.

"Catch ya later, Katie-did," he hissed as he began to walk away. "You'll _definitely _be hearing from me again…" he smirked as Jack moaned, recognizing the words he had said to her in another life…

"…but right now I have business in Atlantic City."

**A/N: I wrote and rewrote this chappie a couple of times, and I've finally got it how I want it. Hopefully Chapter 11 will be up this weekend—we're going to see some Joker-mama in that one, so stay tuned!**

**Once again I want to thank my lovely readers and reviewers, and I also want to give a shout-out to David Byrne, Chris Frantz, and Tina Weymouth, AKA Talking Heads. "Psycho Killer' has long been a favorite of mine, and it just seemed to fit here. Strangely enough, I've always associated the song with Cillian Murphy, especially after **_**Batman Begins **_**and **_**Red Eye**_**. Never associated it with Heath, but then that was before he blew the Joker wide open.**

**I may be in danger of creating a new subgenre of Mary-Sue: the Baby-Sue. Lily is supposed to come across as bright and advanced for her age, and obviously Katie idolizes her, but I think she's just a little too perfect. I may have her draw on some walls or throw a tantrum in public in a future chapter.**

**Is it just me, or is anyone else detecting a **_**Phantom of the Opera **_**vibe to this story? Mmm…Gerik. (The Joker appears and begins to beat author with a lead pipe) Aauuggh! Please stop! I'm sorry! I love you, only you!**

**I'd better stop now, before my A/N ends up as long as the chapter itself. 'Night, all.**


	11. Mama I'm Comin' Home

CHAPTER 11

Connie Napier should have realized something was wrong the minute she unlocked the front door. The apartment was completely dark, and she always left a lamp on. But she was so damn beat she didn't notice until she had already locked the door behind her, and then her only thought was, _Shit. Bulb must have blown._ She groped her way to the end table and was fixing to check it when a voice came from out of nowhere.

"Mom."

Connie shrieked. The shadowy figure in the hall backed away, apparently startled. "Jesus, Mom, what kind of greeting is that for your long-lost son?"

Her heartbeat slowed as she recognized the voice. "Jack?" she said.

"More or less," the shadowy figure replied, a hint of laughter in his voice.

She let the cryptic comment and the laughter slide; Jack had always been a weird kid. "My God, Jack, where the hell have you been all this time? What happened to you anyway? I had the Gotham police callin' me for months! I figured you was in some kind of trouble or somethin'. I kept tellin' em I didn't know where the hell you was, so finally they left me alone." She paused. "So what happened, Jack?"

"It's a long story," he said dismissively.

"Well, where ya been at all this time?"

"Oh, I've been…here. There. And everywhere. For Christ's sake, Mom, you want to turn some lights on in here? Don't you want to get a good look at your son?"

She switched on the lamp. Her first thought was, _Jesus, he's gotten tall. _The skinny boy she had last seen over five years ago had shot up several inches, becoming at least a six-footer. He looked to be scrawny as ever, though, maybe even a little more so than he had been. She couldn't quite make out his face. His hair, golden-brown and curly back then, long and greasy now, hung in front of it like a curtain, and her vision wasn't so good these days anyhow. She refused to wear glasses—whoever heard of a four-eyed cocktail waitress?—and contacts were out of the question. Too expensive.

"You look good, son," she said. _Drugs, _she thought.

This time there was no mistaking the chuckle in his voice. "You, too, Ma."

She knew this for the lie that it was. At forty-six, she looked like a charming maid of fiftysomething. Once upon a far-ago time, Constance Kaminski had been a statuesque beauty with honey-blonde hair and almond-shaped dark brown eyes—"just like Sharon Tate," as one of her countless besotted high-school swains had gushed. Like the unfortunate Miss Tate, Connie had had big plans to become an actress, albeit of the Broadway variety rather than a Hollywood starlet. She just might have made it on the Great White Way, for as well as looks she was possessed of a not-inconsiderable talent.

Then hard times had come calling in the form of one Joseph Napier, or "Mean Joe" as his buddies called him. Connie's dreams of stardom died the day the EPT came up positive. Instead of playing the lead in the senior class's production of _You Can't Take It With You,_ she had been marrying Mean Joe Napier in a seaside hotel where money was laundered more often than the sheets, then quitting school to become a maid in said hotel. Lily had been born six months later.

Now, almost thirty years down the road, Mean Joe was long gone but the stigmata of hard living remained. Connie's beautiful blonde hair was now an over-bleached, over-sprayed mass the approximate color and texture of the yellow cellophane grass found in children's Easter baskets. The dark eyes were heavily made up in an unsuccessful attempt to hide the crow's-feet, and the expression in them was hard. There was nothing left in her now of the beautiful high-schooler with big dreams, nor of the pretty mother from Jack's earliest memories. She looked like a cheap, jaded, over-the-hill floozy.

As these less-than-charitable thoughts flickered in her only son's head, Connie flopped onto the threadbare, cigarette-burned loveseat and kicked off her heels. She dug into her apron pocket and came out with a pack of Virginia Slims. After selecting a cigarette from the pack with great care and precision, she lit it with the battered silver Zippo she had carried as long as remembered. Soon the tiny living room was filled with smoke, and she peered at her son through it.

"Well, come and sit down," she offered. "Tell me what you've been doin' with yourself all this time. Just don't get too specific in case the cops come sniffin' around again." She tipped him an exaggerated wink, expecting him to laugh, but he was silent.

Connie was beginning to be a little creeped out by the kid—_her son. _Jack had always been a strange child, especially after that little shitass Tino had murdered Lily, but he had never frightened her before. Now, though, she was definitely unnerved. For a moment she wondered if this was even her son at all.

Then he came into the living room and sat in the chair opposite her, and said, "So, Mom, you still working at the Pair-a-Dice?" and she knew it was him. He sounded like his old self as he asked the question, even though he was sitting mighty strange—hunched over with his head down instead of sprawled out as he used to do,. His hands dangled between his legs, and she suppressed a shudder as she looked at them. _They _were familiar, at least. He had big, rough hands, with grimy nails and raw-looking knuckles. Bruising hands—the kind of hands that could hurt someone. His father's hands.

"Yeah," she replied to his question as she took another drag. "Probably be there til the day I die."

He didn't seem to be listening. He had picked up a picture from the end table and was studying it closely. She knew very well which picture it was.

Jack had been five and Lily ten when the picture was taken. The photo showed two beautiful children—both with curly golden-brown hair and their mother's eyes—dressed in their best clothes. Lily was smiling brightly for the camera, but her little brother stared somberly, almost as if he foresaw the events in store for the Napier family. Connie vaguely remembered the day that picture was made. She had won a free portrait from a local studio. It had been the only time she'd ever been able to have a professional portrait made of her children.

"She was beautiful, wasn't she?" he asked softly, and Connie felt a lump in her throat. Whatever was wrong with him, whatever path he'd chosen for himself, there was still a vestige of her son in this man.

"She was," Connie agreed, her gravelly voice even rougher due to emotion.

"Do you ever think about her?"

Connie's heart broke a little. "I think about her every day," she told her son. "And you, too. Oh, Jack, what's happened to you? I've been so worried!"

"Have you?" he asked. She couldn't quite read the tone of his voice. She wished he'd get that damn hair out of his face and look her in the eye.

"Of course," she said, stubbing the cigarette out in the ashtray on the coffee table. "I knew you were in some kind of trouble. The cops wouldn't tell me what was going on exactly, and neither would your little girlfriend when she was here. But I knew it had to be something—"

He cut her off. "She was here?" he asked. "Katie was here?"

"Yeah, I guess it was about a month after you disappeared. I don't know how she found me. I guess the police in Gotham told her where I was. She just showed up here one afternoon. She was a pretty little thing, wasn't she?"

"What did she tell you?"

"She didn't really tell me anything. She just asked if I'd heard from you, and when I told her no she asked me to please call her if I did. She said you were in a bad way and needed help. I asked her what was going on, but she just shook her head. She was real upset—she was crying when she left."

He didn't reply for a long moment. Finally, in a voice that seemed oddly strained, he asked, "Was there anyone with her?"

"She came to the door alone, but there was a guy waiting for her in the parking lot. Skinny guy. Had the weirdest blue eyes I'd ever seen. I was headed to work when she came by, so I saw them leaving together."

When he spoke again his voice was deadly cold. Although she lacked the education to identify it as such, Connie felt a _frisson _of fear down her spine.

"She was probably just covering her bases. She married that guy, I guess about two weeks after she came to see you."

Connie was stunned. "Are you sure? Like I said, she was damn near hysterical when she left here."

"Well," he said snappishly, "she must have made a speedy recovery. They _are _married, and they have a kid, and they're living in what was supposed to be _our _dream house."

"How do you know that?" Connie asked, alarmed although she wasn't sure why. "Have you been back to Gotham City?"

She heard him chuckle. "Weren't you listening, Mom? I've been a little bit of everywhere." He paused and added, "I even went to see Dad."

"Your father?" Connie gasped. "You found your father? Where did that sonofabitch crawl off to?"

She heard a smile in Jack's voice. "He was in one of those little fishing villages on the coast of Maine. Apparently that's how he made his living when he wasn't dead drunk."

Connie-the-concerned-mother vanished instantly. In her place was Connie- the-bitter-abandoned-wife. "That bastard. He never once sent us a dime after he left, you know. Never once called to check on you kids. I tried to get in touch with him when your sister died—he still had friends here who knew where he was, even though they wouldn't tell me—but I never heard a word from him. That shitheel." Her voice took on an eager note. "How did he look? Did he look bad? I'll bet he shit when you told him who you were!"

"As a matter of fact, he did," Jack replied calmly. "And yes, he looked pretty bad—but he looked even worse when I was through with him."

Her heart leapt into her throat. "Jack," she said as calmly as she could, "what did you do?" She prayed this was one of his bizarre jokes.

All hope died within her as he finally looked up, and she saw her son's face for the first time. Crazily, the first thought that occurred to Connie was, _My God, he's the Phantom of the Opera!_

But the Phantom's face had only been disfigured on one side. The lumpy, knotted, hideous scars on Jack's face extended from either side of his mouth, forming a grotesque sort of smile. There was a scar on his bottom lip, too, as if it had been split completely in half and then sewn back together haphazardly.

But the scars weren't even the worst part. The worst part was the look in his eyes. There was nothing there now of her son. These were the eyes of a stranger—a mad, obviously dangerous stranger. Connie tried to scream, but seemed to have no air in her lungs.

Jack giggled. "What's the matter, Connie?" he asked. "You look just like Daddy. He _screamed, _though. When I showed him my face, he just _screamed _and _screamed._" He had jumped to his feet without her realizing; now he began to advance toward her, slowly and infinitely threatening. Every fiber in her being was screaming _Get up! Run! _But she couldn't seem to move.

When he was only a couple of feet away her paralysis broke. A small shriek tore from her throat as jumped over the back of the loveseat with an agility she hadn't known she still possessed, clearing it easily. From there she fairly flew to the front door. Her only thought was _Have to get out of here—have to get _away—

Just as she touched the doorknob he grabbed her, spinning her around to face him. His lips moved in a sick mockery of a pout, though his eyes danced with an insane sort of glee as he pulled her toward him.

"What's the matter, _Connie?_" he asked again as she began to scream. "Aren't you glad to see your little boy, _Connie?_" As she struggled vainly he pulled something from one of his pockets—oh, Christ, it was a razor blade!

His eyes narrowed. "You know, you're hurting my feelings," he said with an injured tone. "I thought you'd be _glad _to see me—but you're acting like I'm some kind of _monster_." He thrust his face close to hers. "You wanna know how I got these scars, _Ma_?"

He had a great story all planned out—it was going to be all about Katie and her Scarecrow attacking him after he caught them in bed together. There was even a grain of truth to it; Katie _had _given him the scar on his lower lip during her pathetic attempt to defend herself. But damned if the silly bitch didn't go and faint just as he was getting ready to test his latest story on her.

Oh, well. She was sure to wake up in the next few moments. With a jaunty shrug, the Joker lifted the razor blade to the unconscious woman's mouth. He was whistling as he began to work.

**A/N: So, should she live or should she die? I can't decide. Either way would work out for the story. I'm also sorry to report that another OC will be biting the dust shortly. I really don't like killing people off—how did JK Rowling do it?**

**As always, a big **_**merci beaucoup **_**to everyone who takes the time to read and review. I may polish up this chapter at a later date—I got inspired tonight and just sat down and knocked it out in under an hour.**

**By the way, I had a most excellent dream last night. It had kind of a **_**Brokeback Mountain **_**vibe, with the Joker as Ennis and Scarecrow as Jack Twist, and of course yours truly as the fair maiden who made up the apex of their love triangle (I know there wasn't really a love triangle in **_**Brokeback**_**, but a girl can dream, right?) I can't decide whether I need to post it on here, or just seek professional help. Anyway, hope you liked this chapter and please LMK if you want Joker-mama to pull through or not!**


	12. Darkness

CHAPTER 12

In the days and weeks following the "radio incident", as he had come to think of it, Jonathan Crane kept a close eye on his wife.

On some levels he was reassured. Katie was fairly calm and rational now. There had been no repeat of the scene on the terrace. She wasn't spending her days in bed anymore, and she wasn't sneaking into his office for amphetamines. She was refusing all medication, actually, even her regular antidepressants and tranquilizers. She said she needed her mind clear.

But the familiar lethargy and depression had been replaced by paranoia. She had become obsessed with the idea that Jack Napier had returned. She wouldn't leave the house, and she would barely let Lily out of her sight. In the month since the incident she had left the house only once, for the birth of Lexi's son. Once little Eric Thaddeus Marshall had arrived safely into the world, she had returned straight home, and there she had been ever since. She had never gone out much, but she had made the occasional visit to Wayne Manor or to the Marshalls'. These sorties stopped entirely now. If Alfred or Lexi wanted to see Katie or Lily, they came to the Cranes' house to do it. And they did; Alfred almost every day, and Lexi as much as she could. It was especially hard for Lexi, recovering from childbirth and caring for a newborn, but she still managed to come at least once or twice a week. She was worried about Katie. They all were. They hadn't seen her in this state in…well, a long time. No one wanted to reflect on when that time had been.

At least Lily was happy. Katie was spending every waking moment with her. And she was trying her hardest to maintain a normal façade around her, so the little girl was unaware that anything was wrong. All she knew was that her mother was with her all the time, her constant playmate, and she was on cloud nine. The only downside was that her mommy didn't want to go anywhere, and she didn't want Lily to go anywhere either. But Lily didn't mind so much. She missed going to Wayne Manor and swimming in the pool, and she missed her outings with Mrs. Travers to the zoo and the library, but it was worth it to have her mother's undivided attention. Mommy, unlike most other grownups, was fun. She would get right down and play with Lily just like she was a kid herself. It was almost like having a sister.

For her part, Katie felt like she was reliving her childhood whenever she was with her daughter. Thoughts of Jack still lurked in her mind, haunting most of her waking moments and all of her sleeping ones. The nightmares had increased in force and frequency, and Jonathan was sleeping in the guest room most nights. She knew he thought she was losing her mind, but he was being patient so far, letting things rock along as they were.

Although Jack was constantly on her mind, while she was with Lily she managed to hold those thoughts at bay. Truth be told, Katie enjoyed this time with Lily even more than Lily did. She felt safe, somehow, with her daughter, as they played dolls in the playroom or as they snuggled on her bed reading. Lily adored being read to, and Katie was sure the day wasn't long in coming before the little girl was reading for herself. It wasn't so preposterous. Everyone said she was advanced for her age, even Jonathan, who should know. Katie herself had read at four. She vaguely remembered sitting on the kitchen floor reading _Goodnight Moon _to her mother, and receiving a pat on the head and a distracted "That's good, honey, but quiet down a little. I don't want to wake your daddy."

She thought of her childhood a lot these days. It surprised her to realize that her early years had been a lot like Jack's. There was never enough money. They moved from shabby apartment to shabby apartment as her father bounced from job to job. Thomas Wayne had offered to send money countless times, she had learned later, but James Wayne had refused. "I don't need your damn crumbs," he had told his brother. Her father had been an alcoholic, she knew now. He was an unpredictable drunk; when he was in his cups he might hug you or backhand you. Her mother had always seemed so tired, so old and beaten down. Katie was stunned when it occurred to her that Tracy Wayne had been only a few years older than she was now. Living with an abusive alcoholic husband had aged her considerably. Tracy rarely drank herself, but when she did she had a temper that put her husband's in the shade. It had been that temper that ended their lives.

Yes, there were some uncanny similarities. Katie wondered what she would have been like if her parents hadn't died, if she had grown up with them. Would she have been like Jack—so ruthlessly determined to get out of that life, so hell-bent on revenge on those who wronged him that it eventually shattered his mind? Maybe not. It seemed to her now that the darkness in Jack was a thing of the blood, and would have come out no matter what his upbringing had been. That frightened her, for she was no stranger to the darkness of the mind herself. She supposed it had always been in her, just as it had in Jack, and it had been Jack who called it forth. It was a different sort of darkness, one that turned itself inward instead of outward, but just as destructive in its own way. She had battled it for years, but what if the day came when she couldn't fight it any longer? What if the darkness just swallowed her one day? What would become of her then? What would become of Lily?

She wouldn't let herself think about the worst possibility of all: what if Lily had inherited the darkness? Ridiculous, her rational mind argued. Lily was a happy child, always smiling, affectionate. But still, she wasn't much more than a baby now. The darkness could come later. And when—_if_—it did, what form would it take? Would Lily inherit her mother's despair…or her (probable) father's madness?

Katie wouldn't let herself dwell on these thoughts. She concentrated instead on the reasons Lily _wouldn't_ develop the darkness: her stable, privileged upbringing (for she believed that upbringing did play a role in it to some extent). Her sunny nature. Her empathy and compassion for others—young as she was, she had already grasped the concept that others had feelings just as she did. Yes, the odds were that Lily would be just fine.

She hoped.

--

Katie and Lily were playing dress-up on the day of the next death.

"Mrs. Crane," Emma said from the doorway of the playroom, "you have a phone call."

Katie was busy adjusting her wide-brimmed straw hat bedecked with fake roses. She and Lily were preparing for a tea party. "Who is it, Emma?" she said without turning around. She figured it was Lexi, calling to ask a question about infant care or to tell her something remarkable baby Eric had done. The other day she had called with the exciting news that Eric was kicking his legs and blowing spit bubbles. Katie smiled indulgently, preparing to be amazed at the baby's latest accomplishments. She knew she'd been the same way.

Emma's answer caught her by surprise. "It's a gentleman. He wouldn't give me his name, but he said it was urgent he talk to you."

"Probably a damn telemarketer," Katie sighed. She turned to Lily. "Mommy will be right back. Emma, will you stay with her?" She didn't like to leave Lily alone, even for a few seconds. You just never knew what might happen.

In the living room she lifted the phone from the receiver. "This is Katie," she said, crisply and a little impatiently.

"Katie, Katie, Katie Wayne," rasped a voice in her ear. "Or Katie _Crane_ I hear it is now. How've you been, sweet cheeks?"

Katie's heart began to pound. "Who is this?" she managed to ask. But she already knew, even before he answered.

"You mean you don't remember _me_?" The voice that had haunted her nightmares sounded hurt, but she could hear the laughter underneath. "Why, Katie, I'm _hurt_! We had so much, hm, _fun _together! More fun than you've ever had with the Scarecrow, I'll bet. Tell me, how's he doing? And how's that _be-yoo-tee-ful _little girl of yours?"

Katie's blood turned to ice water. Her vision swam. She grabbed the phone table for support; she was sure she was going to faint. Oh God, he _was_ back. And he knew about Lily. She tried to speak, but all that came out was a strangled croak.

"Cat got your tongue?"Jack—Joker—whatever the hell he was calling himself these days giggled. "Well, Katie-did, I'd love to chat awhile and reminisce about old times, but I have to get to the purpose of my call. Y'see, I've got an old friend of ours here, and he's just _dying _to speak with you?" The giggle skidded into that maniacal laugh she remembered so well. "Alex, say hello."

"Katie!" She wouldn't have known him if she hadn't heard the name. Alex Martinez's voice was as crazed and high-pitched as Jack's, but Katie could tell it was from fear.

"Alex!" she gasped. "Alex, oh my God, are you all right? Where are you? What's going on?"

"Katie, you've got to get away!" Alex screamed. "You've got to get out of Gotham! You've got to hide somewhere! Jack—he's crazy! He's completely fucking insane! You wouldn't believe what he looks like now—"

She heard Jack in the background. "I'm _not_ insane. No, I'm _no-t._ You're _definitely _gonna die for that little remark, _hombre_."

"He's going to kill me, Katie!" shrieked her old friend. "He's going to kill us all! He says he's going to take out everyone who ever knew him as Jack Napier! He—oh, Christ, he already got his parents! His own fucking parents! He showed me pictures! Oh, Jesus—" He began to sob.

"Ah, ta-ta-ta-ta," Jack was back on the line. "You'll have to excuse Alex, he's getting a little—_emotional _here. I'd tell you not to believe a word he says, but you see, it's true. _E-_ver_-y _bi-_t. _I _am _fixing to kill our old buddy Alex, and then I _am _coming for all of our other old pals—Darren, Lexi, Thad, even dear old Alfred."

Katie struggled against a wave of nausea. "No," she whispered. "You can't do this."

"Oh, but I _can_," he gleefully informed her. "And I _am_. And I _will_. But don't worry, Katie-did. I'm saving _you _and your cute little family for _last._ You'll get to watch _ev-_ery-_one _you care about bite the dust before it's your turn—unless, of course, they manage to catch me first. But I wouldn't _coun-t _on that."

Katie was gripping the table so hard her knuckles were white. Her heart was slamming against her ribcage. Any minute she expected it to burst right through her chest. She kind of hoped it would. Maybe if she was gone, he would leave her family alone.

"Oh, and Katie?" Jack sing-songed. "Alex _was _wrong about one thing. There's _no point _in hiding. You _can't_ get away. I have _ways _of finding you. I will _al-ways _find you." She heard a scuffle, then Alex's ragged breathing again. "Say good-bye, Alex."

"KATIE! KATIE, BE CAREFUL! YOU'VE GOT TO WARN EVERY—"

There was a deafening noise. She knew it was a gunshot. She slid to the floor and began to retch into the Persian carpet, the receiver still clasped in her hand.

"Well, it was nice talking to you, Katie-did," Jack growled. "You can go out and try to warn everyone if you want. See where it gets you. Word on the street is you're not much more than a raving lunatic yourself these days. But maybe they'll believe you—not that it'll do 'em any _good-uh_."

"Jack," she moaned, her stomach still roiling. "Jack, please—"

"I _told _you," he snapped, and there was anger in his voice for the first time, "_Jack is dead!" _And with that the line went dead.

Mercifully, Katie lost consciousness then. She didn't hear Emma calling for her. She didn't hear Emma's shriek when she found her. She didn't hear any of the commotion that followed. When she awoke, she was in her own darkened bedroom, her husband at her side.

She bolted upright. "Jonathan!" she gasped.

He had a hold of her in an instant. "Shhh," he soothed. "Hush now, Katie. It's going to be all right." In the dim light she saw the gleam of the needle.

"NO!" she shrieked, struggling against him. "No, damn you—no—no—"

She fought as hard as she could, but she was still weak, and he was stronger than he looked. She let out a wail as she felt the needle pierce her skin.

Within seconds she had lapsed back into unconsciousness. Jonathan gazed down at his wife. His vision blurred as tears filled his eyes. "Oh, Katie," he said sadly.

Then he went to call Arkham.

**A/N: I'm baaack! I didn't think the writer's block would ever lift…but I knew if it did, it would be when TDK finally came out on DVD. Happily, that turned out to be the case. I'm a little rusty, so this chapter is kind of short and not quite what I wanted it to be—but hey, it's here! I'm pretty sure I know where it's going now. I want to give a shout-out to Sakura. and, I believe, ImmatureEvil (I lost the email but I'm pretty sure that's who it was) for the suggestions. Well, I have a family Christmas gathering tomorrow so I'd better get on to bed, but don't worry, I'll update again soon. Methinks I'm on a roll again.**


	13. A Visit to the MCU

CHAPTER 13

Someone was calling her name.

"Katie…Katie, wake up. Katie…"

It sounded like Jonathan. For a brief moment, Katie hoped that the events of the past several days had been a terrible nightmare, and she would open her eyes to find herself in her own bed, in her own house, with Jonathan demanding to know if she had slept all damn day. But even as she hoped her nostrils filled with that unmistakable institutional smell, and she knew it wasn't gonna happen. She would find herself in Arkham when she opened her eyes, as she had been for…well, she wasn't sure how long. The voice was undoubtedly that of one of the doctors, nurses, or orderlies, although it was odd they were calling her "Katie"; they usually called her "Mrs. Crane" and treated her in a deferential manner as befitted the wife of one of their psychiatrists.

She decided not to open her eyes.

The voice was tinged with impatience now. "Katie, damn it, wake up. _Katie!_" if it wasn't Jonathan, it sure sounded just like him…or maybe she was hallucinating again.

"Katie! Open your eyes right this instant! I know you're not really asleep, and I've got to get you over to the police department!"

_Right this instant_. Yep, it was Jonathan, all right. She opened her eyes.

Sure enough, she saw the white walls and worn linoleum of Arkham. But it was none other than her husband standing at her bedside, and—oh happy day!—he was holding some of her clothes in his hands.

"Morning, sunshine," she croaked. God, her mouth was dry.

"This is no time for your facetiousness," Jonathan snapped. "We have to be at the Major Crimes Unit of Gotham Police Department in an hour. I don't know what you've done now, Katie, but so help me God—"

"I haven't done anything," Katie said, confused. "How could I have done anything? I've been here in the cuckoo's nest for…how long have I been in here anyway?"

"Ten days," Jonathan confirmed. "A…Detective James Gordon called the house a couple of hours ago asking for you. When I told him you were indisposed"—Katie was lucid enough to smirk at the euphemism—"he asked that you come to the Major Crimes Unit as soon as possible to speak with him. He was…very insistent about it. Katie, did you call the police about Jack?"

Katie shook her head. "I don't think so," she said.

"Are you sure? Not even before your last…breakdown?"

"No," she replied, sitting up. "I was going to call them after…after I talked to Jack last, but…he …and I was sick, and…then I was in here. I never got to call them."

"Well, Detective Gordon said it was 'pertaining to Jack Napier,'" Jonathan pressed. "Are you absolutely sure you didn't call them and maybe just—forgot?"

She knew what he was driving at. "I _never called them, _Jonathan!" she snapped, a little more viciously than she'd intended. He stepped back.

"All right, Katie," he said in the patented "Soothing-Patients" tone. "All right. Just…get dressed then, and we'll go see what this is all about. OK?"

Without another word, she got up and yanked the clothes from his hands. He had brought her a Gotham U sweatshirt and a pair of jeans. As she began to dress, she couldn't help being amused at the fact that he turned his back.

"You can look, you know, Dr. Crane," she said mockingly. "I'm not one of your patients—well, not _just _one of your patients." He whipped around and arrowed his icy glare at her, but didn't respond. He stayed facing her as she finished; however, his eyes never seemed to fall on her.

They left Arkham by a side door to find a taxicab waiting for them. Jonathan, ever the gentleman, opened the door for Katie and helped her into the back. She acknowledged his chivalry with a curt nod. They rode to the Major Crimes Unit in silence.

During the short ride, Katie didn't think about where they were going or why; she was just too happy to be in a car, wearing her own clothes, going someplace, being _free_. When they pulled up to the tall, imposing gray building, though, she remembered what this was all about. They wanted to talk to her about Jack. What were they going to tell her? That he was indeed on the loose and coming after her and hers? Or maybe that he was dead or otherwise incapacitated, and everything from the last few months had been only in her mind? Which would be worse?

She couldn't suppress a small shiver as they walked up the concrete steps. Surprisingly, she felt Jonathan's arm go around her.

She turned to him. "What are they going to tell me?" she asked quietly. There was no mockery or defiance in her now. She looked small, lost, scared, and very young.

He gazed down at her, and there was nothing now of the doctor reassuring a troublesome patient. He was only a man concerned for his wife. "I don't know," he replied just as quietly. "But whatever it is, we'll deal with it together."

--

The inside of the Major Crimes Unit was dingy, cramped, noisy, and poorly lit. However, Katie didn't get much of a chance to look around before they were ushered into a small office. This office was every bit as dingy and cramped as the outside, but much quieter and slightly better lit. Behind a battle-scarred wooden desk sat a vaguely familiar man. _I know him from somewhere, _Katie thought, _but where?_

The man rose as they entered. "Mrs. Crane," he said as he came wound the desk and extended his hand. "Dr. Crane. Thank you for coming." He shook each of their hands in turn. "Mrs. Crane, I'm Officer Jim Gordon. I don't know if you remember me, but—"

"I do," Katie said as it came flooding back to her. "You were at Wayne Manor after…" she faltered.

He gave her a reassuring smile. "That's right." He had changed some in the last few years, Katie noted. He was slightly stooped now, and his hair, which had been brown then, was leaning toward salt-and-pepper. But the eyes were the same, although the lines around them were deeper. Blue eyes, not as striking as her husband's but still pretty. Mild, kind eyes, with a certain keen intelligence lurking underneath. This was a good-hearted man, but you'd have to get up early in the morning to pull one over on him.

"Please, have a seat," he was saying. She shook herself out of her reverie and sat in one of the hard plastic chairs he indicated. Jonathan took the other. "There's fresh coffee if you'd like some, or I could get you some water or a soda."

"No, thanks," they murmured. Gordon took his seat behind the desk. There was an uncomfortable silence. Katie decided to break it.

"You know it was Jack," she said abruptly. "At the party, I mean, and afterward. Jack was the Red Hood." Jonathan shook his head at her slightly, but she pretended not to notice.

Gordon cleared his throat. "Well, yes," he said. "We do know now that Mr. Napier was responsible for the Red Hood robberies. At the time, though, he was never even a person of interest. He had no prior criminal record—although he had murdered Tino Arroyo in Atlantic City years earlier, but he was never a suspect in that either. But that's not what this is about."

He took off his glasses and began to polish them, more as a way to keep his hands busy than anything else. "Mrs. Crane—"

"Katie," she said. "Please call me Katie."

He flashed a tired smile. "Katie, then, I'm afraid I have some bad news. A few days ago we received a call from the Philadelphia police department. They were looking into the death of a man named Alex Martinez."

Katie felt like she'd been punched in the stomach. Alex. It was true, she hadn't imagined it. Oh, God, Alex. Tears sprang to her eyes as memories assaulted her: meeting Alex for the first time at Gino's, Alex doing his Chong impression, Alex and Jack arm-wrestling while she cheered them on…oh, Christ. How could Alex be dead? He was one of the most alive people she'd ever known.

Officer Gordon was offering her Kleenex as Jonathan stroked her hand. "I'm sorry, darling," he soothed. To Officer Gordon he said, "My wife has been ill recently. She's not fully in control of herself right now. I'm sure you understand."

Gordon fixed Jonathan with a slightly frosty gaze. "Well, the death of an old friend is enough to upset anyone," he said. Jonathan flinched a bit. The two men stared at one another with inexplicable but definite dislike.

In the meantime, Katie had accepted the Kleenex, dabbed at her eyes, and composed herself. "I'm sorry," she said. "Please continue."

"Mr. Martinez's death was originally thought to be due to a fire," Gordon continued after giving her a sympathetic look that nearly caused her to start bawling all over again. "However, further investigation revealed that he had in fact been shot, and the fire set to cover up the crime. Unfortunately, several other people died in the blaze."

Katie covered her face with her hands. At the sounds of distress from the two men, she held up one hand indicating that she was fine, and to go on.

"A man was seen around Mr. Martinez's apartment building shortly before the fire started," Gordon said. "He matched the description of Jack Napier…except this man had rather horrific facial scarring."

Katie sat bolt upright. "He cut himself with a piece of glass," she gasped. "That last night, the night he went crazy…he stuck a piece of glass in his mouth and he…" Racked with shudders, she couldn't finish.

"Yes, Mrs. Crane, we know," Gordon said gently. "It was in the police report you made when he disappeared. While the Philly PD was tracing Mr. Martinez's history, trying to find out if he'd had any enemies, they contacted us. When we heard about the scarred man who fit Jack Napier's description, we started to put two and two together. We began to do a little investigating of our own."

He paused then, and pulled a battered pack of cigarettes from his coat pocket. "You don't mind, do you?" he asked. "Technically this is a no-smoking building, but…"

"Not at all," Jonathan surprised her by saying. "In fact I'll have one myself if it's all right." She turned to look at him, shocked; she hadn't known he smoked.

He took out a pack of his own, pulled out a smoke, and wordlessly handed the pack to Katie. She accepted it gratefully. If she'd ever needed a cigarette it was now.

Once they all had a comfortable level of nicotine in their bloodstreams Gordon resumed the ghastly story.

"During the course of our own investigation, we attempted to locate Jack Napier's mother in Atlantic City. This was quite difficult, as no one answered the number we had on file, and the address we had was abandoned. We finally found her in a New Jersey hospital."

Katie jerked so hard she nearly burned herself. "A hospital?" she squeaked.

"Yes," Gordon said uncomfortably. "Apparently several days before he killed Alex Martinez in Philadelphia, Jack Napier visited his mother. He attacked her…quite savagely. She was in the hospital with severe facial lacerations. Severe enough that she would have required surgery."

"Would have required?" Jonathan asked.

Gordon sighed. "Yes. Apparently she got hold of a mirror somewhere, and when she saw the extent of her injuries she…well, she cut her IV line and an air bubble reached her heart."

Katie was beyond shock now. She could only stare, dazed.

"She did talk to the police before she died. She said that Jack had admitted to her that he killed his father. Joseph Napier did vanish from the small town in Maine where he'd been living a few years ago, but his boat vanished as well and it was believed he had been lost at sea. He lived under an assumed name in this town, so there was no way to connect him with his son."

He stubbed out his cigarette. "Katie, she said something else too. She said that Jack told her he was 'going to get' everyone who'd ever known Jack Napier…but most especially you."

He paused then, waiting for her reaction. Jonathan was waiting too, she knew. Well, she was going to surprise them.

"I know," she said calmly.

She felt rather than saw Jonathan start. Gordon stared at her incredulously. "You _know?_"

"Yes," she replied. It was time to tell her own story: the story that began the night she heard the dedication on the radio, and ended with the phone call that sent her to Arkham. And that's just what she did.

**A/N: Finally, an update! This has been a hellacious winter. I had no inspiration for the longest time, and then when the inspiration finally struck I was having PC issues. But everything is resolved now, and I've already begun work on Chapter 14. After 14 though, it gets a little hazy. All I know is that we're nearing the end--three or four more chapters, tops.** **If anyone has more ideas for Joker fun/Katie torture, let me know. Otherwise we'll be reaching the denouement within a couple more chappies. As always, mad love to my readers and reviewers.**


	14. The Search Is Over You Were With Me

CHAPTER 14

**(Jack/Joker-Katie fans be forewarned: this chapter contains Jonathan-Katie lovins. The divine Dr. Crane has decided it's his turn to get a piece of the action. Consider yourselves warned.)**

Katie held her breath as the taxi approached Arkham. Her relief when they passed by it was indescribable. She nearly burst into song and/or hugged the driver, but managed to hold her emotions in check. She merely turned to Jonathan with questioning eyes.

"I don't see any need for you to return there," Jonathan told her. "You were admitted for hallucinations, and since they turned out _not _to be hallucinations…" He trailed off.

"I get it," Katie said wryly. "Like that T-shirt: 'Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not all out to get you'."

Jonathan couldn't hide his smile. "Well…yes."

Her euphoria was short-lived. As the left the Narrows and headed to their own affluent section of the city, she mulled over the events of the morning and everything they meant. So she wasn't crazy, but there _was _a madman on the loose and targeting her and everyone she cared about. Well, that was just dandy.

"We need to call everyone," she said. "Alfred, and Lexi, and Darren Phillips—I think he's still in the city somewhere. I haven't spoken to him since he and Jack had that fight and he moved out."

"Detective Gordon is taking care of that," Jonathan replied. "He said he would inform everyone who needed to be informed and assign them a police guard. Including us, of course. And I'm having a home security system installed."

"I hope it's a good one," she said. "He's pretty good with that stuff, you know. When he was the Red Hood, he disabled one house's security system with no trouble at all."

He glanced at her sharply. "I thought you didn't know he was the Red Hood."

"I didn't until…well, that night. I was interested in the case, though. I read everything about it. Maybe on some level I knew…" She fell silent.

"Well, this security system is supposed to be the best there is," he said briskly. "It'll make our place like Fort Knox. It's manufactured by your company, by the way."

It took Katie a minute to realize what he meant. "Wayne Enterprises?"

He nodded. "It just didn't seem right to purchase one from anywhere else. And Lexi's father assured me this is the best security system there is."

"Mr. Fox said that?" He nodded again. Katie was slightly reassured. "Well, if he says it's the best, then it's the best."

The taxi came to a stop then. Katie's spirits rose a bit at the sight of their house. They rose even further when she thought of who was in the house—someone she was dying to see. "How's Lily been doing?" she inquired. "Has she missed me?"

"She's fine," Jonathan said. "She's asked about you every day. Mrs. Travers told her you were on a trip, and she's been asking every day when you were coming home. She's going to be thrilled to see you." His indulgent smile faded. "She doesn't know anything, of course. Try not to…" He hesitated, not knowing exactly what he meant.

"To let her know what's going on?" Katie finished for him.

"Well, yes."

He was rewarded with a flash of anger in her eyes as she drew abruptly away from him. "Jonathan, she's not even three," she snapped. "You think I'm going to waltz in there and tell her there's a psychopath after us all? I'm not crazy like you thought, and I'm certainly not _stupid_. Even if I did tell her, she wouldn't know what the hell I was talking about."

He wasn't so sure. Having spent more time with the child in the past week than ever before, he found himself constantly amazed and a little unnerved by her intellect. In many ways she was more like a child of five or six than two and a half. He knew she hadn't entirely bought Mrs. Travers' explanation about Katie's trip—her first questions had been where she had gone, and why Lily and Jonathan hadn't gone with her. It had taken several elaborate fictions to satisfy her. There was no way to tell Katie of all this without inviting more of her derision, so he only shrugged as she stormed out of the cab.

She was already inside the house when he climbed the front steps. With a rueful sigh, he thought to himself that, crazy as the past few hours had been, at least their relationship was back to what passed for normal. Somehow the thought didn't bring him much comfort. Shoulders slumped, he entered the house and shut the door behind him.

--

Fuck. He'd been found out. She knew she wasn't crazy; they all knew she wasn't crazy. Fuck, _fuck, _FUCK!

He'd been careless when he offed Alex. He'd been seen. He'd known it at the time, had planned to take care of the witnesses, but with Jack squealing like a stuck pig in his head, pleading for the life of his friend, he hadn't been able to think clearly. He had just barely managed to kill Martinez, set the blaze, and escape.

Jack was yammering away even now, making his head throb. _See, she knows. She's not as weak as you thought. You're not as good as you thought. She knows, and the PD knows, and they're all going to be watching for you, and your plan is screwed. It's over! It's over! _

"No," he muttered. "It's not over by a long shot, Jacky-boy." His plan was temporarily thwarted, but with a few revisions he could make it play. He would have to let go of his vendettas against the Marshalls, Alfred and Darren, at least for now, and focus on the Cranes. And it would be some time before he dared to make a move on the Cranes. The Gotham PD, especially that sickeningly gallant Gordon, would be keeping a close eye on them.

But as time passed, the constant surveillance would grow lax. Gordon and the department's attention would be called to other matters. Some of these other matters would be his doing; many would not. In a city like Gotham, watching over one family would soon be relegated to the back burner with all of the other crimes taking place.

And eventually the Cranes would grow careless too. It would probably be some time before Katie allowed her little princess out of the house or her sight, but that day would come. You couldn't keep a kid cooped up inside forever. And the minute they were out and about, and Katie turned her head for a split second…Yes. It was going to be well worth the wait.

_But why? _screamed Jack inside his head. _Why do you have to do this? You're in control now, you've won. I don't understand why you're doing this!_

"Because of you," he snarled out loud. "As long as there are people out there you care about, you'll be whining around in there trying to trip me up. Once they're all gone you'll go away and I'll finally be free." Free to cause untold chaos. Free to destroy Gotham City and maybe even the world. What a kickass life he would have once he was rid of Jack. Jack wasn't exactly a conscience—he had never once stopped him from doing something he set out to do—but sometimes he succeeded in confusing him enough so that he bungled the job. Like with Martinez. Not for much longer, though. He had a feeling that once Katie was out of the picture all the fight would go out of Jack. Of course he was still going to kill all the others, just to make sure and for the hell of it, but Katie Wayne Crane was the biggie. He began to daydream about just what he would do to her once he had her in his clutches, giggling as Jack screamed.

"Boss?"

His head snapped up as his daydream was rudely interrupted. It was one of the new guys, a pockmarked kid of about fifteen who hadn't yet learned that when the boss was talking and laughing out loud to himself it was best to leave him alone.

"What?" he hissed.

The kid shifted uncomfortably. "I…I was just makin' sure everything was all right in here."

The Joker was on his feet in an instant. "Everything's right as rain in here, kiddo. Right as rain." His eyes danced as he advanced on the cowering kid. "You look nervous. Is it the scars?" His voice dropped into a friendly conspiratorial tone. "You wanna know how I got 'em?"

--

Later that night Katie sat alone in her room. It had been a long, exhausting day, but sleep was the farthest thing from her mind. There was too much to think about.

Lily had indeed been ecstatic when her mother appeared in the nursery doorway. After all the hugs and kisses and "I missed-missed-_missed _yous!" had subsided, the little girl had wanted to know every detail of Katie's trip. She had spun fabulous tales of her beach vacation, unaware that Jonathan had told the child she was skiing in Canada; and Lily had said nothing to clue her in. Katie was still unaware of the two conflicting stories.

She had spent the entire day with her daughter. She had told the little girl her favorite bedtime story upon tucking her in, a story of Katie's own creation about a beautiful princess and a handsome knight. Lily had requested the story during her mother's absence, and when Mrs. Travers had attempted to tell her the classic fable of a similar name she had flown into a spectacular tantrum. That wasn't like Lily, Katie mused as she sat at her vanity table brushing her hair. That wasn't like Lily at all. It concerned Katie.

She would be even more worried about her daughter if she didn't have other, bigger fish to fry. But bigger fish were hopping around in the skillet (_what? _she thought. _Hopping around in the skillet? What were they _giving _me in that place?_)

So Jack really was back—or rather his crazed alter ego. Earlier Katie had wondered which would be worse, finding out it was true or finding out it was all in her head. Well, now she knew.

But what she couldn't figure out was _why. _Why, after all this time, would this Joker character decide to start picking off the people who had mattered to Jack Napier? Jack was gone; the Joker had full control of his body.

Or did he?

Katie recalled the night the Joker had taken over. Jack had fought him then; he had managed to regain control just long enough for Katie to escape. Was it possible that Jack was still in there, tormenting the Joker as the Joker had once tormented him? Was the Joker seeking to eliminate Jack by eliminating the people he had once cared about?

Who had he cared about the most? His sister, certainly. But she had been gone for many years; according to Jonathan, her death had probably been the catalyst that brought forth the Joker in the first place. His parents were dead, by his hand. So was the man who had been his best friend.

That left…Katie herself.

She knew Jack had loved her. When he had told her that terrible night that he had initially been after her money, but then had fallen for her, she had known instinctively that he was speaking the truth. If not for the other circumstances—the evil-alter-personality-emerging circumstances—she knew she would eventually have forgiven him for targeting her in the beginning. God help her, she _still _loved Jack Napier. Not a day went by when she didn't think about him, and pray things could have been different. Not a day went by when she didn't think about what she could have done to save him.

But there were other people to think about now. Like Lily. She loved that child with a fierceness that rivaled, even surpassed, the love she had felt for Jack in the early days. She loved Lexi and Alfred, too. And Jonathan…well, she wasn't sure exactly _what _she felt for him, but she knew she cared for him. She certainly didn't want him to die. She didn't want any of them to die, especially not in the horrible ways the Joker had no doubt planned.

She loved all these people. But to the Joker, they were expendable. She, Katie, was the one who had been important to Jack. If she was removed from the equation, maybe the Joker would be satisfied and leave her loved ones alone.

_And what if he isn't? _her rational mind argued.

But Katie was physically and emotionally exhausted. She was coming off some major antipsychotic drugs. She had spent the last few hours alone, worrying, obsessing. Her decision was already made.

_If he isn't, _she thought, _if the Joker isn't satisfied with that, then if God is kind we'll all be together again very soon._

--

Jonathan hadn't meant to spend the whole evening in his office. During Katie's hospitalization he had let things slide a bit, at least by his standards. Now that she was home, he had intended to spend only a few minutes catching up on his most important cases before spending the evening with her, helping her process everything that had happened that day.

But as usual the time had gotten away from him, and when he finally looked at the clock it was half-past ten. Katie was most likely asleep by now. Well, that was all right. Perhaps it would be better for her to have a full night's sleep before dealing with the enormity of Jack Napier's return. Truth be told, he thought as he climbed the stairs to their suite, it might be better for both of them. He was already looking forward to climbing in next to her and just holding her all night. He had missed the familiar warmth of her during her time in Arkham and before, when he had been sleeping in the guest room.

But apparently she wasn't asleep; he could hear the sound of water running. She must be taking a shower or bath. Even better. She was still awake, and she would emerge from the bathroom in one of her silky nightgowns, with the bewitching fragrance of her shampoo and body wash hanging about her…his cheeks pinkened as he felt the beginning of an erection. Of course, he wouldn't push her for that. But if she seemed amenable…

He was smiling as he got undressed and slipped between the sheets. But as the minutes passed his smile turned to a faint frown. Something wasn't right.

The water…it was trickling. Their shower head was adjustable, but Katie liked it on the highest setting—what she called the "pin-you-against-the-wall spray". On that setting it was so loud it sounded like a staticky TV turned up at full volume. Could she be taking a bath? No, that wasn't right either. Katie always used the Jacuzzi when she decided to soak; it was even louder than the shower. This sounded like the sink. But what could she be doing at the sink that would take so long?

Alarm bells were sounding in his head. Swiftly but quietly, he got out of the bed and crept to the closed bathroom door. "Darling?" he called softly. "Are you all right in there?"

There was no response.

His mouth went dry as his heart began to beat a frantic tattoo in his chest. He fought to keep his voice calm. "Katie, are you OK?"

Still no answer.

He was really panicking now. "Katie, I'm coming in." He strove for his commanding tone, but it came across as suppressed hysteria. He tried the doorknob.

The door was locked.

Hysteria took over. He put his shoulder to the door and slammed against it, again and again. Finally it flew open, and he collapsed in the doorway. Groaning in pain, he forced himself to focus on the scene within. Immediately all pain was forgotten.

Katie was kneeling on the closed toilet lid, her arms extended over the sink. For one terrifying moment he thought she had cut off her hands somehow. In the next moment he realized it wasn't so; her hands were simply hidden beneath the ruby red water that filled the sink.

She hadn't moved when he burst through the door. Her head was bowed. The ends of her hair trailed in the crimson water. And she was pale, so pale…

Somehow the doctor in him managed to overpower the hysterical husband, at least briefly. The doctor in him jerked Katie's hands out of the dreadful bright water. The doctor examined the cut wrists—they were bad, but he'd found her in time; she'd be all right once they were bandaged. The doctor found the emergency first-aid kit in the medicine cabinet and set about cleaning, medicating, and wrapping the wrists. Through it all Katie sat docile as a child, motionless as a doll, allowing herself to be ministered to.

Once the doctor had attended to the physical crisis, the husband came flooding back. Jonathan couldn't stop himself from seizing Katie's shoulders and screaming into the immobile face, "WHY, KATIE? WHY?"

She had the strangest sense of déjà vu. If you had asked Katie Wayne Crane right then where she was, she would have replied, "Why, Jack's apartment, of course." There were hard fingers biting into her shoulders. There was a screaming man. There was Katie herself, unable to respond, unable to move, unable to think. Any minute his hands would move from her shoulders to her throat…

But of course that didn't happen. Jonathan forced himself to relax his grip on her shoulders. He forced a modicum of control into his voice as he asked again, "_Why, _Katie?"

She shook her head slightly. This wasn't Jack. This was Jonathan. _Her husband. _Jonathan had never hurt her. Could never hurt her. He had never loved her the way Jack had, but he had never hurt her the way Jack had either.

He misunderstood the head shake. "You don't know?" he asked. "You don't know why you did this?"

Finally she found her voice. "I was…saving you," she rasped. God, it was so hard to talk. She was so tired. All she wanted to do was lay her head down and rest…just rest…

But he wouldn't let her. "_Saving_ me?" he repeated incredulously. "How can you possibly think you were saving me?"

She turned her head away in irritation. Didn't he see? "Not just…_you,_" she said. _"All_…of you. Lily, and Alfred, and…" Too tired to go on, she stopped.

He didn't seem angry anymore, but she didn't trust that. Jack hadn't always seemed angry, either. "Saving us from what, Katie?" he asked softly. "From Jack?"

He was beginning to understand, but he still didn't have it. She shook her head again. "Not…Jack…" She had to pause for breath. "Jack…good…would never hurt…saving you from the _Joker_."

He wanted to question her further, but she was semiconscious. He was afraid to let her go to sleep just yet, though. She had lost a lot of blood. So he did something he would have frowned upon with any other patient: he gave her an amphetamine. Then he took her downstairs to get some food into her, something with iron.

There was a package of hamburger patties in the freezer. That would do. He slapped two into a frying pan, hoping the smell wouldn't wake everyone else in the house. Once the hamburgers were done, he fed them to her like he was feeding an infant, piece by piece from his fingers, with no bun or anything.

After she finished the first patty the color came back into her cheeks, and she seemed a little more alert. Just to be on the safe side he fed her the second before taking her back upstairs.

Once they were back upstairs he sat her in the chair in their room and resumed his questioning.

"Now, can you tell me why you thought killing yourself would help everyone who cares about you?"

She was more or less herself again, and when he put it that way her desperate act did seem foolish. But she managed to explain her reasoning to him: that if she were out of the way, the Joker wouldn't come after anyone else. She had planned to sacrifice herself for her child, her best friend, the man who had raised her…and him, Jonathan.

He could sort of understand where she was coming from. And, flawed as her reasoning was, he couldn't help but feel some admiration for her. She had been willing to die to protect the people she cared about. How many people could say the same? He wasn't sure he could. But he knew one thing: he didn't want to live in a world without Katie.

He couldn't tell her this, however, so he began listing every other reason she had no business killing herself: she couldn't leave Lily without a mother. Alfred would be devastated, might even suffer a heart attack or something; he was far from a young man. Everyone in danger was currently under surveillance, as well protected as possible. The police were actively seeking the Joker. They would catch him soon, and Katie's death would have been for naught.

She interrupted him here. "They won't catch him," she said. "You don't know…you can't know…he won't let them catch him. He's going to come after us sooner or later." her words were calm, matter-of-fact. But her face was a study in heartache, her eyes bottomless pools of pain. He had never been able to stand seeing her in such obvious agony.

He intended to soothe her with some doctorly platitude. But for once in his life, and completely without meaning to, Jonathan Crane did the right thing.

Folding his trembling wife into his arms, he told her, gently but firmly, "It's going to be all right. I won't let him get anywhere near you or Lily. I'll do whatever I have to do to protect you both." He spoke not as a doctor to a patient, but as a man to his wife.

She gazed up at him in astonishment. "Jonathan…" she said slowly. "Jonathan, you love me, don't you? Even now…" Her eyes were wet.

He swallowed hard. "I didn't think you'd ever realize it," he said huskily.

Then she was crying in his arms as she had so many other times, and he was trying to soothe her, whispering, "Don't cry. Don't cry," even as the tears slid down his own cheeks.

"Jonathan,' she wept. "Jonathan, I have to tell you something." She pulled away and took a deep breath. "It's Lily—she's not—I'm not sure who—"

He embraced her again. "I know," he said. "But it doesn't matter now." As he spoke the words he realized they were true. "It doesn't matter," he repeated firmly. "As far as I'm concerned she's our daughter, yours and mine. Please, darling…" _Darling. _He had always called her _darling, _but now she could hear the love and tenderness in his voice. Had it always been there? She thought maybe it had.

_He's a good man, _she realized. _My husband is a good man. _He had married her even though her heart belonged to another man, one who had warped her mentally and emotionally. He had accepted her child as his own without question, knowing he possibly—_probably_—wasn't the father. He had borne all that followed—the pills, the depression, the isolation—with what she now saw was a quiet strength and an unending patience. And continued to love her through all of it.

Katie knew what she had to do now. She drew her husband's head to her own and kissed him as she never had before—deeply, passionately. He responded with an intensity and hunger she never could have imagined from him. When the kiss broke, he gazed deep into her eyes, searching for the answer to an unspoken question. When he saw that the answer was _yes, _for the first time in his marriage he swept his wife into his arms and carried her to their bed.

That night Jonathan Crane followed his heart instead of his head, and was rewarded with his wife's cries of genuine pleasure, her body arching and curling and straining to meet his, her eyes wide open and focused on him, only on him. They made love over and over again, in ways they never had. Katie could hardly believe this inventive, passionate man was the same Jonathan she had always known. He couldn't believe that this insatiable wild thing was the same indifferent Katie.

In between they talked and laughed and behaved like any young couple in love, making love for the first time. They gave one another a guided tour of scars and birthmarks. He told her about his first wet dream; she told him about her boarding-school suitemate's impressive hidden stash of porn. They didn't divulge every bit of their sexual histories. She said nothing about Jack, and he didn't mention that he had lost his virginity at seventeen to a call girl. They kept their recollections light and humorous, and they giggled like children before coupling yet again. It was near dawn before they finally fell asleep, totally spent, wrapped in each other's arms. Both their heads were full of swirling, conflicting emotions—fear, love, and most of all a sense of wonder that the Joker's return had, in a very real way, led them to one another.

--

The sun was streaming through the windows when Katie awoke, but that wasn't what woke her. What woke her was the trail of soft kisses Jonathan was planting on her neck and collarbone, working his way steadily downward.

"Morning," she said sleepily. As she stretched she saw the white gauze on her wrist. So last night hadn't been a dream. Well, she thought as she recalled _all _the events of the previous night, she could live with that.

"Good morning, darling," he murmured against her skin. "I didn't think you were ever going to wake up."

"What do you need me awake for?" she asked over a yawn, grinning mischievously. She already knew the answer to that.

"I can think of several things," he replied, raising his head to kiss her lightly on the lips. As he did he caught sight of something in the doorway.

"Uh-oh," he said in a mock-serious tone. "Don't look now, but we've got company." Katie raised her head to see Lily hovering in the doorway. "Hello, Curly Locks."

She giggled, but didn't move. She stood there watching the two of them with something close to astonishment. Here were her parents, in the same bed, and _kissing. _And Daddy was _smiling. _None of these things occurred very often in Lily's world, especially all of them together.

"Hey, angel," Katie said, holding out her arms. "Come get in with us."

Lily needed no further invitation. Dragging her ancient pink bear behind her, she took a flying leap and landed square in the middle of the bed. _This _had _never _happened before! She had often gotten in bed with her mother in the morning, but never while her father was there too. She shot a sideways glance at him to see what he was going to do. But he was still smiling, so she relaxed and snuggled into her mother's arms.

"What happened to your arms, Mommy?" she asked as she caught sight of Katie's bandages.

Katie hesitated for the briefest instant before replying. "Mommy had a little accident. I'm fine, though."

Satisfied with this explanation, Lily turned to Jonathan. "Are you going to work today, Daddy?"

"Nope," Jonathan replied, reaching over to tousle her reddish-blonde curls. "I'm going to stay right here with my two best girls…and I was thinking about making some Mickey Mouse pancakes." His smile grew teasing. "Any takers?"

"ME!" Lily bellowed.

Katie winced. "Jesus, Lily, I need that ear," she said. "And what, may I ask, is a Mickey Mouse pancake?"

"Ask our daughter," Jonathan said as he pulled on his robe. That he had said "our daughter" instead of "your daughter" was not lost on Katie.

"Daddy knows how to make pancakes that look like Mickey Mouse!" Lily bubbled. "He makes a circle for the head, and circles for the ears! He made them for me a lot while you were gone!"

Katie arched an eyebrow. "Mickey Mouse pancakes, huh?" she asked. She couldn't imagine Jonathan making any kind of pancakes, much less with fun shapes. But she was beginning to realize there was a lot about her husband she didn't know.

"What can I say," Jonathan shrugged, "I'm a man of many talents."

"Obviously," she said, getting out of bed and putting on her own robe.

Lily was practically vibrating with joy. "Mommy, Daddy, come on!"

"We're coming," Jonathan said, laughing. He scooped the little girl up and headed for the stairs. "You can help me mix the batter again. We'll make Mommy a special welcome-home breakfast, what do you say?"

As she followed her husband and daughter down the stairs, Katie allowed herself to believe, just for a minute, that everything would be all right after all. They would catch the Joker soon, and everyone would be safe. She and her little family would get their shot at happily ever after.

_I love you, Jonathan, _she thought as she walked down the stairs behind them. _I really do. From now on, I'm going to be the wife and mother you both deserve._

Her hand slipped beneath her robe and found the slim silver chain she always wore. The chain she had never taken off, even for her wedding. Even during her hospitalization at Arkham. The chain she wore in memory of the man who had given it to her, not the monster he had become.

_Even…if I can't help but love Jack just a little bit more._

**A/N: Sorry if this chapter got a little fluffy at the end, but I figure the Cranes deserve a little fluff right now. It won't last, I can assure you.**

**It looks like I'm going to have a little extra time off this summer due to budget cutbacks at work (love this economy!) so I'll probably be finishing this story pretty soon. But then I've thought that before. I will try to update faster than I have been of late, however.**

**CYA time: Mickey Mouse is owned by Walt Disney, the Batverse is owned by DC Comics and assorted others, and my OCs are owned by me. The band Survivor owns the song title "The Search Is Over (You Were With Me All The Time)" which I borrowed for the title of this chapter. Cheesy, yes, but it seems to fit here.**

**Thanks to my aunt for introducing me to Mickey Mouse pancakes (and chocolate-chip pancakes, but that's another story). And as always, thanks to the readers and reviewers who have stuck with me on this long, strange trip. **


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